


Empyrean Iris

by starrfallknightrise



Category: Earth is space Australia - Fandom, Original Work, humans are space orcs - Fandom
Genre: Don't copy to another site, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-31
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 23:33:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 25
Words: 180,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21957433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starrfallknightrise/pseuds/starrfallknightrise
Summary: No less than two years after humanity's acceptance into the  Galactic Assembly and participation in the Drev War, most aliens have still never seen a human. Rumors run rampant about these strange, powerful predators, so much so  that news of them has spread across the known universe.Krill, an alien surgeon stationed at the galaxy's largest trauma center, hardly has time to believe these rumors, but a freak accident aboard a human spaceship  brings him in contact with the first human he has ever met.  Fascinated by their wonderful strangeness , he finds himself a member of the crew under a young and inexperienced captain with no idea what he's gotten himself into.
Comments: 82
Kudos: 221





	1. Chapter 1

On September 13, 1848 of the human historic record, a male human by the name of Phineas P. Gage is described as surviving, a 3-foot 13 pound tamping rod shot through the left side of his face, frontal lobe, and out the top of his skull. Reportedly he spoke within minutes of the accident and walked away from the scene, though extreme personality changes were also noted after the accident.

Dr. Krill became aware of the transmission as a frantic buzzing in his right lateral antennae. The sensation was neither pleasant nor unpleasant but sent a shock of awareness through his body encasing both his dorsal and ventral trunks in an eruption of fizzes, tiny bubbles rising up his insides.  
In response, Dr. Krill sent out a shortwave radio burst to accept the transmission as he stepped in to check on yet another of his patients. He performed a quick scan of the unmoving figure with his thermal receptors noting the proper interior heat before turning to survey the Tesraki’s injuries. The patient’s prognosis was poor, but that was common for those beings who initially survived intergalactic slavery rings.  
As he was finishing his examination and stepping from the room, a second transmission burst through him bringing the earlier fizzing to a buzzing inner static.  
Dr. Krill to the Emergency Bay, Dr. Krill to the Emergency Bay.  
Overhead, the internal lights of the bustling medical center lengthened to a critical red. The slight adjustment added an air of urgency to his movements as he turned towards the docking bay calling up one of the railed floor transports which quickly whisked him away, down and onward towards the emergency medical docking bay.  
“Preliminary Report?” he inquired as he was pulled swiftly around a corner and down another long hallway. Medical personnel stepped aside for his passing, each barely looking up from their lab results, reports, or patients as he flew past. As the primary trauma physician aboard the intergalactic transit center, he was known to always be in a hurry.  
Doctor, we have an emergency SOS from the U.N.S.S Harbinger requesting immediate medical assistance.  
Dr. Krill had never heard the moniker U.N.S.S. The sounds were alien to him, in no language that he understood, and he was fluent in many languages and dialects. Even his translation equipment could not decipher the first little bit, but the second part came through.  
Harbinger: an entity or thing that heralds the arrival of another.  
Quite strange, most GA ships had numbers, not names, and such a strange name to have he thought as the transport took another corner leading him through the optics ward and out onto the central thoroughfare between the two buildings. Resting medical workers and doctors sat under an inky sky lit only by the light of their towering, neighboring gas giant whose massive red and blue surface dominated the greater part of the night sky.  
Before he knew it he had passed into the second building, that much closer to his destination. A distant sound of engines roared above in the night sky, the ship drawing ever closer.  
“Species?” he ordered as he took another corner.  
He didn’t have to wait long for the information to come through. A spotty, and somewhat unfinished, biological map of…wait…  
“What species is this?” He asked, letting the question hang on the air as he tried to piece through this unfamiliar information set before him.  
“Human biological map. 23% completed, data restricted.”  
Humans?  
Dr. Krill had never seen a human before. Sure he had heard about them, who hadn’t. Their discovery and eventual involvement in the Drev war had been legendary. The stories that had been brought to them by way of transport vessels and the galactic news feeds had been unbelievable, legendary and almost supernatural. For this reason, Krill doubted many of the stories. As a Vrul, he was a creature of reason, logic and science and he didn’t subscribe to impossibilities, rumors or fabrications. If he were to believe anything, he would believe the knowledge gathered by his own senses.  
While traveling to the EMB, three of Krill’s independent cortical hemispheres had been analyzing the biological map. The information was so sparse he wouldn’t even attempt an autopsy if it came to that. He glanced down to see who had collected the data: Dr. Kedd.  
Interesting, he had never heard the name before, though it sounded Vrul or Gibb perhaps, not that it mattered.  
As he drew closer to the emergency wing and its attached docking bay, Krill began to feel the rumbling. It was a powerful sensation that shook the floors and the walls as if they were experiencing a worldtremor. The transport dropped him by the doors leading into the emergency bay and he scuttling across the floor as fast as his legs would consent. The door ahead opened with a sharp hiss bathing him in a mist of microbial decontaminants. The rest of the trauma team were already assembled and prepped. The doors to the docking bay had been thrown open to give them a view of the outer docking field.  
And what a view it was.  
A peculiar alien ship was descending from the sky on a pillar of fire, a massive black monolith supported by flames and engineered in sharp, violent metal lines which seemed to claw at the sky as if intending to rip its way through space. The sound it made was deafening, like the roaring of the stars translated from the vacuum of space directly into the engines. A few of the medical crew backed away as the ship lowered itself on its pillars of fire taking the weight of the ship as it eventually settled into a deep hunch against the ground, powerful and malefic against the dark night sky.  
As soon as the engines cut and space was plunged back into its relative silence, light spilled from the interior of the ship. It was bright white and filled with oddly moving shadows darting quickly back and forth as the ramp lowered towards the medical bay deck. The hydraulic hiss it made as it lowered was deep and chilling, echoing across the bay like a warning call from one predator to another.  
A swarm of shadows rolled to the edge and then spilled off the ramp. Silhouetted by the bright light from behind, the ship’s creatures were an amalgamation of churning limbs. The doctor was fascinated by the way the humans moved: quick and lithe one moment and then sharp but fluid the next, every movement a flowing masterpiece of muscle, sinew and bone. They were bipedal creatures, their gate precise and balanced.  
He tore his gaze away from the approaching group and back towards the sterilization field which made his senses stiffen with dread as if a powerful predator was behind him. Is that what humans were?  
He spread his appendages into the decontaminate field which enveloped his proffered limbs in a sterilizing, hardening gel. Behind him, one of the medical assistants activated a sterilization drape and cast it over him from behind. The field fell over his body and conformed to his shape sucking tight against his thick exterior, sealing over his eyes and mouth to prevent contamination.  
He turned from the spot just as the creatures were pulling to a stop. He could hardly tell where one creature began and the other ended. They were just a mass of revolving multi-colored derma.  
Krill’s eyes registered the intense radiation of a bright long wave light: so much red. By Sanctum’s rings, he hadn’t seen so much red in a long time, where was it coming from? The mass of writhing limbs was separating, pulling apart like creatures dragging themselves from the sticky pool of mud.  
He was left with a ... strange sight. The creatures stood in a loose open circle, towering over the doctor by a good three feet in some cases. As he looked on, they turned to face him ... strange: a solid, bone frame held together by a bulging mass of tissue that absolutely writhed and churned like thousands of worm’s pulsing together to create the creature’s movement. At the apex of their trunk a thick round protrusion sat on a short, thick stump.  
Glowing orbs which glittered with a gelatinous slime stared at him from the recesses of their rubbery stumps as the worms below their derma contracted and released pulling the derma tight on a surprisingly malleable face, the biologic map reported the human word. An orifice, mouth, sat below two cavernous holes, eye sockets, in the head. The mouth opening and closing wetly like an exposed gash. These open wounds stretched back showing the horrific sight of beige tinged bone coated in slime.  
Their thick upper limbs ended in a pentad of spidery protrusions that twitched and wriggled with their agitation. These creatures could not stay still.  
The noises they made were deep and booming to his ears, dropping into the lower register of his hearing. Their breathy, gravely, nasally and guttural primal grunting raised in agitation and engulfed the room with their raucous and disorderly vocalizations.  
He extended his upper limbs in a placating fashion, though, deep down he could feel fear and trepidation boiling up inside him threatening to send him retreating in the other direction. He felt his translation equipment engage.  
“Where is the injured creature?”  
The group grew unusually still. Little black spots at the center of their glowing eyes contracted like they were focusing in on a target.  
“Are you blind?” One of the creatures boomed, throwing a bulging limb wide in a strange and aggressive gesture. The doctor stepped back in trepidation, these creature was volatile. The way its eyes darted about the room was jerky and unpredictable. It rocked back and forth just on the verge of movement and Krill felt like it might strike at any moment.  
With one limb still outstretched, a dangerously low growl erupted from the open cavity in its elastic face, “Help him!”  
Another spidery hand reached out, one of the other creatures gripped the first by the outstretched appendage in a show of dominating force, “Calm down Lieutenant, its ok. I’m ok.”  
Dr. Krill turned to examine the creature that spoke. It was standing --rather unsteadily-- at the center of the group, supported by no less than three of its companions: the source of the bright red wavelengths. Unlike its counterparts, it was very still, staring forward though only one eye was visible in the face as the other was obscured in what Krill considered a strange fashion but having no knowledge of humans he was unsure as to what was normal with their species.  
The doctor did a quick once over. The location of the trauma seemed to stem from the right ocular socket, however he was somewhat skeptical about severity of the damage as the creature was coherent, speaking, and supporting itself rather well. It appeared just like the rest of them, maybe a little pale in color perhaps with near translucent derma to match its tawny fur, though that might have been normal, “I am sorry. I am not familiar with your species, what exactly is the problem?”  
A cacophony of bellowing sounds assaulted his tympanal membranes.  
He almost ran, and even then he couldn’t stop the high-pitched keening that broke from his mouth as the creatures snapped. Their voices raised in powerful bellows of rage that rattled him in place. They stalked closer in their anger.  
“Are you kidding me?”  
“Somebody find a real doctor!”  
“KNOCK IT OFF! THAT’S AN ORDER!” This shout was so loud it cowed the incensed creatures causing them to curl inwards in submission and stalk backwards though their eyes still remained trained upon Dr. Krill. Their large dark pupils threatening to pull him in like a planet succumbing to a black hole.  
“You haven't seen a human before, have you?” The creature at the center said conversationally. Out of all of humans, he seemed the most sober and calm and yet the other humans continued to support him.  
“I have not, but I assure you I am the best trauma surgeon in the galaxy and will help if you could explain the nature of your injury.”  
“Well, I am going to give you a quick human anatomy lesson.” The human raised a limb and motioned towards his face, “This, this right here sticking out of my face… let’s just say it ain’t a fashion statement.”  
The doctor moved forward a little to get a closer look, but the human was a much taller making it difficult to see. “Are you trying to tell me that the object protruding from your face does not belong there?”  
“You’re quick Doc. So you think you can help me out because I think I have something stuck in my frontal lobe, which might cause me problems down the line?” Not once did the human’s voice waver or crack.  
Dr. Krill had the medical team move the human into position on a transport stretcher while he tried to decipher the bio map and the human’s words.  
He leaned in close to peer at the human. It was very, very strange. A bipedal endoskeleton operated by a series of contracting and lengthening fibers, triggered by electrical pulse, and insulated by a runny stew of fluid kept in place by a smooth sack covered in tiny sensory cilia. The more he looked, the more the bio map began to make sense. A large muscular pump in the center of the trunk pushed life-sustaining fluid through its body. Fascinating.  
“Hey doc, you plan on doing anything at all about the screwdriver in his brain?” One of the humans snarled from his spot on the other side of the room.  
The doctor turned to look at him as his translator fed him the conversion. Had the human spoken wrong? He was a trauma surgeon in one of the largest hospitals in the known universe, and he had never seen any creature survive cerebrum trauma. That was medicine 101: brain injuries are terminal, “I think you might be exaggerating just a bit,” he said tilting the human’s head carefully this way and that.  
“That screwdriver is eight inches long and half of it is inside his head.”  
“He would be dead.”  
“Well, he isn’t”  
“He would at least be incapacitated or…” he said brushing the human off with a wave, “The trauma seems minimal judging by the behavior.”  
Something gripped him tightly about his upper appendage. He felt a jolt of fear shoot through his trunk as he was pulled face to face with the human whose large green irises and the black void at its center froze him in place, “I won’t be this calm for very long doc, luckily for you the human brain can block pain signals in dire emergencies, but it isn’t going to last forever and then we are all going to be very, very upset.”  
Now that seemed like an outright lie, “Are you sure your cortical zone is located in your head because…..”  
The human’s face churned for a moment, pulling its maw down at the corners, “I think I would know where my own brain is.”  
“If that was the case then this would be a very serious injury,” the awareness was coming slowly. Krill had trained his entire life for this position, as all Vrul did, but this-  
“Yeah, accidental lobotomies tend to be kind of serious, that’s why we came here as an emergency instead of slapping a bandage on it and calling it good.”  
Behind the translation, he could hear the modulation in the human’s voice raising a few octaves as it spoke. It may have been a barbaric system of speaking, but it was quite complex and quite fascinating.  
The realization struck him.  
By Sanctum’s Rings!  
He suddenly realized what he was looking at. He hadn’t seen anything like this outside of the death rooms. Red spilled down the front of the creature’s face from the remnants of the destroyed orbital socket. The optical orb was completely ruined and the red -- which he now understood as blood, an essential human body fluid -- ran freely down the human’s face and neck before dribbling onto its chest. Finally understanding what he was seeing, he couldn’t fathom how the human was still standing. The small nerves that ran through its face and head bone should have been sending absolutely blinding pain signals to the appropriate cortical area, but here it sat calmly eyeing him with that remaining orb, its spidery hands sat folded in its lap.  
As the information continued to flow in he got to work, completely fascinated and half horrified by the scene before him. The rest of the medical staff --unaware of the dire situation-- moved sluggishly until galvanized by his shrill orders which sent them scurrying to and fro like a pack of Kinlits searching for food.  
“Alright everyone we have a prefrontal, deep-cortical trauma.”  
“Deep cortical?” They had never treated a cortical injury before. Those were generally treated out back by a furnace or a freezer before being launched into space with the rest of the medical waste.  
“Yes deep cortical trauma, try to keep up please.” With a quick burst, he partially inflated the helium sack at the back of his head, neck and shoulders, giving him buoyancy and height as he rotated around the human calculating the precise angle of entry. Angled as it was, it had destroyed the eye but could it have lessened damage to vital cortical tissue?  
Comparing his estimates to the biological map in his notes, he determined that there was a very high likelihood the object had actually slid into one of the cortical folds. Of course, even a little bit of damage to the brain should have been instant death, but what should have happened did not matter now. What mattered at this moment is what did happen and what it would take to keep this human alive.  
“Prepare the surgical suite,” he ordered, “and get the rest of them out of here before they contaminate the entire floor.”  
As he re-examined the human, he found the color of the dermal layer to have lost its rosy tone. It would be important to keep him reactive as long as possible. The aperture of the eye would be an important indicator of neural function his notes suggested.  
He shined a light towards the eye, “Does your species give you names, human?” He asked as the dark aperture shrunk at the touch of the light.  
“Captain Adam Vir,” the human said, voice growing distant though his pulse was still strong and the bleeding around the wound had ceased.  
Interesting, humans had more than one name like the Tesraki, and a title like the Rundi.  
“Tell the techs to bring in some imaging equipment to the operating room.” While giving his orders, he was still examining the bio map. With so little data it was difficult to understand, and the classification system was an absolute wreck, but apparently there were four separate cortical hemispheres-- three of them working together to puzzle out the issue-- he thought he understood.  
The human would require a spinal block for paralysis, and surgery required the human be unconscious for the duration which involved a chemical shutdown of the frontal operating cortex. The method was either applied directly into the bloodstream or by gas to the breathing organs, lungs, which brought oxygen into the blood. He would send this information to their resident chemic immediately. Of course, he could have whipped up a batch of the chemical himself had it been required, but he preferred to keep his talents in the realm of medicine.  
He quickly barked orders and before long a drug tube was inserted into one of the human’s fluid tubes, veins, a clotting agent was applied to the wound, a respiratory kit was acquired, a nerve block was administered and the magnetic fields were generated. He would need to keep the human semi-erect to restrict the object from sliding further into its cerebrum. Once the body was secured; he would introduce the medication for unconsciousness, secure an airway, acquire the necessary imaging, and then begin the operation.  
The human was moved quickly from the emergency bay and into the operating room. They would need to monitor the chest pump, heart, the breathing, and the gas levels within the blood if they wanted to keep him alive. Additionally, he wanted cranial wave readings.  
It wouldn’t do if he went and added more damage to what had already been done.  
Their chemic arrived a minute later with the proper formula.  
The human’s remaining ocular orb rolled listlessly in its socket. It was not a good sign compared to its earlier activity, it was growing rather lethargic. Dr. Krill decided to order the imaging first, and was immediately rewarded with a direct feed by way of radio signal. The image… was surprising: the object had definitely gone into the brain, but it had cleanly broken through the back of the eye socket severing the optic nerve before sliding miraculously between two of the gyri causing as little damage as one could possibly have hoped. Of course, removing the object was complicated and could result in supplementary damage.  
Any other doctor would not have hoped for much of an outcome, but Krill wasn’t just any doctor. He was the premier trauma surgeon in the known universe.  
His team of surgical assistants moved forward now. The chemic introduced a precise dose of the chemical agent to the human who immediately sagged and then fell listless. Simultaneously, members of the surgical team applied the spinal block and calibrated the magnetic fields which supported the human in the proper position for the surgery. Bloodied clothing was removed and discarded as medical waste as the human was thoroughly sterilized.  
The doctor stood waiting as his medical team established a controlled airway on the human before opening the surgical floor to him. He wouldn’t need more than his own four limbs and a single assistant for this operation.  
Filled with newly acquired human anatomical knowledge and a proper view of the human in a controlled environment, he couldn’t help but be captivated. The more he looked, the more fascinated he became. He had not been this excited about his work in quite a long time.  
This thing, this creature was like nothing he had ever seen: both frightening and thrilling. As he began the surgery, he suddenly became aware of his extraordinary and unique position in the galaxy. He would be the first Vrul, nay the first entity in the known universe to perform a cortical operation on a trauma patient. He was once again at the forefront of medical science. He was going where no doctor had ever gone before. He would be the first to publish on cerebral surgery.  
He had been so focused on the injury to the head that he had not had time to thoroughly examine the rest of the body. One of the lower appendages had a dermal layer covered in coarse threadlike strands, but the other appendage… there was no other lower appendage. The human’s mass stopped halfway down and was socketed under a sleeve which cupped to a simulated appendage.  
The human was living with a missing limb! Not only that, but it had been replaced with a reproduction. A cursory inspection revealed the counterfeit limb was a mixture of metals and fabricated tissues. Cordlike structures inside the metal casing mimicked working tissues while fine hair-like wires imitated the nervous system. He had never known a creature to survive without its limbs. He knew of species that regenerated parts of their anatomy after removal and still others that were born with genetic defects but they never lived longer than a few years and their quality of life was inferior. It appeared that was untrue for a human.  
Krill should not have been surprise since the human was still alive to undergo the current procedure. His practiced hands removed the object from the brain through the broken socket, and out to a waiting tray. After the wound had been packed and bandaged and equipment put into place to monitor intracranial pressure, the human looked almost whole.  
It was still breathing, and that powerful pump inside its massive chest was still thundering away. It was nothing short of a miracle, and the doctor didn’t subscribe to miracles.  
Returning to his office after overseeing the stabilization of his patient, he was overcome with astonishment at what he had just accomplished. He had saved a human’s life. He had performed brain surgery and the patient was going to live. He was going to be the foremost researcher the medical field had ever seen.  
But it was not just the knowledge he had gained, or the information he would soon be able to share; no, there was something else… gazing at the tranquil surface of their neighboring gas giant, he realized he was not in awe at the procedure that he had performed, but for the human he had performed it on because what kind of creature can survive multiple traumatic wounds?  
What kind of creature has the right to defy fate?  
***  
He was beginning to understand.  
Dr. Krill floated in the center of his office suspended in an eclectic constellation of projected medical charts, and 3D anatomical scans all taken from his most recent, and only human subject.  
He spun in a slow circle taking in the virtual explosion of information. He had not planned on such an extensive project. It had all started with a simple curiosity regarding the human’s visual system, but once he had entered he had been sucked in like a beam of light caught in the event horizon of a black hole.  
He steadied himself and spun in a circle towards the origination. He cast his appendages to the side causing all the projections but one to scatter towards the periphery of his visual field where they bunched together in a tightly packed group. The remaining diagram was a scan he had taken, and then refined after significant study. He wanted to begin with something simple.  
As it turns out, the human nervous system was remarkably similar to the Vrul. The executive cortical structure was housed in the uppermost structure of the body. The human itself had only half as many cortical hemispheres as did the Vrul, and the two hemispheres were extensively interconnected. He could not be sure what that meant for the human, but he suspected that humans may not have the ability to use each appendage independently as the Vrul did.  
He reached up dragging an upper limb slowly through the projection. In response, the human hologram spun in a slow circle, showing only the dense fibers of its nervous system. In some areas, these sensory fibers were packed quite densely: the face, the hands, and the groin, while in other places they were almost non-existent.  
The second most similar structure to the Vrul was the scaffold, or the skeleton, though the similarities were in function only. Here he swiped a skeletal overlay onto his hologram. The Vrul had a skeletal structure that was much lighter and encased their entire frame protecting all important structures by tucking them inside, except for weak points where joints allowed their bodies to hinge. The human skeletal structure on the other hand was encased in their softer more vulnerable tissue.  
The skull was an acceptable design as was the structure of the cage which encased vital organs, but some hung suspended without proper protection. The trunk of a human was significantly more complex than it was in other species. He supposed the spine was also acceptable: a well-engineered complex array of protective bones that still allowed humans a great measure of flexibility that was non-existent in a Vrul.  
Surprisingly, additional simulations he had run on the interior structure indicated that human bones had a power to weight ratio that made it almost five times stronger than certain metal alloys. Disbelieving, he had to run his numbers again, and after the fifth time receiving the same results he could only conclude that the science was accurate. The frame of the Vrul sacrificed weight and strength for full protective coverage, while the human skeletal system sacrificed coverage for weight and power.  
In fact, it was a simple case of the worst luck that had allowed the human to sustain a brain injury in the first place. Had the point of the rod been driven against any other part of his skull or at an oblique angle, it may have been deflected. Doctor Krill was not himself an engineer, but the general structure of the skeletal system frustrated him more so than the nervous system.  
In a bout of frustration, he selected another overlay hoping the additional information would help him make sense of the mess that sat before him.  
Overlay number three was where the human structure completely diverged from that of a Vrul ruining the doctor’s hopes of simplicity. As a consumer based creature, the human had a complicated energy-consuming system of tubes, organs and fibers that must have required a great deal of energy to run. The Vrul required only the light, and a reasonable supply of carbon to survive. Humans required oxygen in order to survive and circulated that gas through a pair of sacks in the chest which provided it to the liquid supply of vital fluid that was pumped through the entire body by way of a massive pump inside their chests.  
The Vrul had analogous structures to those of the human’s lungs and heart though the resemblance was only passing. Krill found himself marveling at both the lungs and the heart. A Vrul ‘heart’ needed to beat a few times every minute in order to circulate the proper chemicals throughout the body, but the human heart was forced to constantly pump vital fluid through a vertical structure, with enough power to shoot blood vertically at least four feet up. The Vrul were generally no more than three feet tall, so circulation was not that big of an issue.  
As for breathing, Krill was quite surprised to learn that human breathing could be both automatic and manually controlled. In fact, their unique vocalizations required them to have just that ability. If a human really wanted to, they could just ... quit breathing.  
In fascination, he activated the next overlay. He supposed the muscular system did explain much of why the humans had such a minimal skeletal structure. Where the organs were exposed, a thick fibrous layer of muscle tissue enveloped or encompassed them and the squishy tubes, keeping them safe from impact or injury. The muscles were surprisingly strong and he supposed if the fibers were flexed during impact, they might be able to stop the interior from being damaged. Of course the Vrul had muscle, otherwise they wouldn’t have been able to move around, but it was minimal when compared to a human. If his calculations were correct, a human was capable of lifting 130 % of his own weight comfortably, but pushing the skeleto-muscular structure to its max…. 500 % of its own weight.  
With another fascinated wave, the doctor called up the last overlay finally coalescing these alien sets of biological systems into one single living creation ... the human. This seemingly chaotic and mesmerizing structure of nervous system, skeleton, smooth muscle tubing and organs was held together by one last layer: a thin porous casing or membrane—pale in color-- patterned with delicate cracks and minute craters like the heat-cracked surface of a desert planet. The dermis was remarkably flexible and waterproof, but delicate enough that he could see the thin veins of blue spidering underneath.  
He floated away from the image as if distance would give him a different perspective while helping him to understand this intriguing creature. The sightless shell stared down at him with its large, wide eyes and the more he stared, the more he was overcome with a visceral feeling of imperfection. He couldn’t explain what it was, but there was something ... missing in the image.  
Drawn by the desire to explain the feeling, he floated forward across the floor, and adjusted his buoyancy coming face to face with the human’s projected image. Looking into its eyes he was gripped by the sudden impression that he had reached the edge of the universe itself and peered into nothingness. The feeling was so gut-wrenching, so absolutely repulsive that he pulled back and ordered the image away upon reflex.  
The void-filled eyes blinked out of existence leaving him alone and trembling in his empty office. He released some of the helium in his sack and floated back to the floor reaching for something to touch, something to connect him to reality and away from the abyss of those eyes. This didn’t seem right, sure he had been scared of the humans the first time he had seen them, but they hadn’t made him feel so… petrified.  
He berated himself for such silly notions. It was a simple image, nothing more than photons interacting with his eyes, and it held no inherent danger. He had plenty of reasons to be afraid of the humans. They were omnivores but their wide, forward-facing eyes marked them as predators. They had not attacked him despite being the only sentient predator race in the known galaxy. They did seem to be rational creatures.  
He beat back the absurd fear using logic as a blunt weapon. With his newfound determination he commanded his research back into place standing amidst a storm of swirling projections as they returned. The human image leapt back to life and then erupted into its separate components far less disconcerting broken down, like how a building could be imposing, but those same architectural plans were just lines.  
If he could just…  
His lateral antenna buzzed and the bubbles erupted down his sides in response, “May I come in?” the transmission queried.  
Recognizing one of his colleagues, he responded in the affirmative and quickly cleared his research to one side of the room as the wall dissolved.  
A fellow Vrul floated into the room and was immediately drawn to the jumble of research. “You have been busy,” the doctor sighed and came to stand next to his colleague. Together they scanned the wall of information.  
“I see you haven't managed to shake yourself of this fascination,” he stated flatly, reaching out and idly rotating one of the overlays.  
“I cannot let it pass,” the doctor returned feeling a sensation prickle inside him. It was a ravenous feeling, like requiring starlight after long hours spent in the dark. “These humans are nothing our galaxy has ever seen before, so strange and quite amazing. We can learn so much from them. With a little more time we could-”  
“Does the director know about this little side project of yours?” The other Vrul cut in turning his back to the research and scuttling across the length of the office to stand before the viewing field. Outside their gas giant hung brightly in the night sky. As bright as it was, there was hardly a need for any artificial light.  
The doctor felt himself deflate slightly, enthusiasm draining from the pads of his appendages as they settled on the cold synthetic floor. He remained where he stood, “No, I-”  
“You have neglected to speak with the director?” the Vrul turned, antenna humming with disapproval. “I must be blunt with you doctor. It seems to me that you think because you are the highest ranking galactic surgeon that your actions are always acceptable.” He walked past the doctor and paused again before the research.  
“You are here to satisfy the Vrul’s duty to the Galactic Assembly.” He rounded on the doctor who stood statue-still in the center of the room, “Your previous actions have already been a cause for concern. First, you leave our home world without being ordered, which is unprecedented. Then, you are constantly involvement with the intergalactic medical community at the expense of your home world and now your fascination with humans.”  
The doctor felt exasperation and resentment build up inside him like air in a bottle under extreme pressure, “My ‘involvement’ in the medical community is nothing more than completely logical. We cannot just stand by and keep our knowledge from those we have sworn alliance with and we cannot reject the truth or knowledge when it presents itself.”  
“That is not your job doctor. Your job it to protect and further your species. This insatiable curiosity of yours creates discord and disunity. This is why the council has been sent to evaluate you on so many occasions.” The two floated across the room away from each other, as physically passive as their words were aggressive.  
“You need to let this go. You are too concerned with your experiments, with your research, and with those papers you are so intent on writing. They are none of your concern. You are here only to fulfill the treaty with the alliance and once your duty is over you will return to our world where our species belongs. You should not be wasting your abilities on those not of our species!”  
The slight bubbling in Krill’s body had now turned to a frantic humming and as the anger grew, the static only grew worse. “You are invited to leave,” he said stiffly, floating over to hover before his research. Behind him the overlay of the human’s skeleton loomed silently, disturbed only by reflected light beaming in from the observation field.  
The other held his ground for a moment though a quick glance over Krill’s shoulder had him scuttling quickly from the room as empty eyes from the hologram bore into his back.


	2. Chapter 2

Hemispherectomy — A type of procedure perfected and performed by humans, which requires the removal of one hemisphere of the brain, usually done to treat seizure disorders resistant to medication, or other surgical intervention.

WARNING: Procedure only possible on human subjects.

Captain Adam Vir of the U.N.S.S Harbinger awoke to a horrible itching sensation high on his upper thigh. He wasn't quite sure where he was or what was going on, but one thing was for sure: this couldn't be allowed to last.

He cracked his eyes only to be immediately and forcibly blinded by the overhead lights. Weakly, he raised his hands to block out the beams, the action causing him to feel stiff and woozy. Something was blocking the vision of his right eye leaving everything dark. With spasmodic motions, he reached up to his face running a hand over the bandages wrapped around his skull.

That was weird. He couldn't remember an accident.

It took a while for his vision to adjust, and once it did, he ended up with more questions than answers. Despite what he thought had been blinding light, the room was actually rather dim. The floor was a matte grey/purple color, and strips of eerie blue light wound around the top corners of the room casting a bluish glow upon the strange equipment, which surrounded him.

Could he be dreaming? No, he felt too disjointed to be dreaming.

He groggily turned his head to look down at his body, which was practically plastered with tiny little sensors adhered to his skin: on his hands, on his neck, on his chest, on his stomach, and so on. He even had an IV in his right arm, which was placed surprisingly well.

A moment of clarity came when he realized there was no bed in the room! He was suspended in the air, legs and arms floating freely within a relatively restricted area alien abduction style. He was curious about the technology that allowed this, and while it was cool, he didn't exactly appreciate the cold breeze that licked seductively down his spine like an icy lover. He tried to move, tried to sit up like he would have on a bed, but his attempts failed leaving him floundering in mid-air.

He tried to call for help, but nearly choked on his own dry tongue gasping and coughing against the sandpaper plastered to his throat. Off to his left side—the side he could see from—one of the strange machines began blinking. He tried his best to summon up some spit to wet his throat and call for help again. It was a pretty good attempt, if failing miserably was the goal. The machine began to blink more frantically.

He drew in a large breath determined to make himself heard this time, but at that moment, one of the walls to his right dissolved away, and a figure stepped through the opening. Surprises like that were surely not good for his heart at a time like this. The machines by his side began blinking with even greater urgency as he tried to tug himself from the forces that still held him in place.

"Relax," the creature said as it approached slowly, "I am the doctor that performed your surgery and am here for the post-op examination."

"Surgery?" Captain Vir wondered, a single eye dropping to look at this 'doctor' distracting from his earlier questions. "Cool," he heard himself murmur. An alien stood before him. It couldn't have been more than three feet tall looking like some sort of cross between an ant and a bacteriophage. It had four lower limbs: two sticking out from the front and two sticking out from the back; each of its legs had a single joint at the analogue of a knee bent at about ninety degrees to just before ninety degrees. Unlike an ant, the trunk of its body rose from the junction of its four legs rising into something that resembled a torso with a chest and shoulders. On its upper trunk, it had four limbs: two on either side of the torso stacked on top of each other. In this way its anatomy was almost human.

It had a slim neck that supported a bulbous head in which were its eyes: hexagonal prisms in a ruddy orange color not dissimilar to that of a fly. The eyes took up a good portion of its face leaving a low opening for a mouth which was nothing more than a slit in its face. On either side of the head, two thick antennae stuck up and back. When the doctor turned, he could see the creature's spherical head split apart in the back to form four separate hemispheres.

A drape of folded skin lay over the back of the head, down the neck, and onto the upper shoulders. He couldn't have said what it was for.

"Excuse me, but what are you?" he asked as the "doctor" approached. Without warning he suddenly found himself shifting from a reclining position into a vertical while floating forward.

The doctor stopped in front of him, "You ask a lot of questions for someone with mild brain damage. Is that normal for your species?"

"Mild...brain damage? Now hold on. When or how did I end up with brain damage?"

"You don't remember?" The doctor asked, stepping in to read the machines.

"No," Vir said hesitantly, "I remember we were finishing some repairs in engineering, and then I woke up here."

The doctor stepped away from his machines and moved to stand at the human's side. With a sound like an inflating balloon, the flap of skin at the back of his head, neck and shoulders began to inflate until he was more than 40% his original size and floating a good inch above the floor.

Captain Vir's eye widened, "Awesome."

The little doctor kicked lightly at the floor to rise into the air in order to unwind the bandages, "As an answer to your question, human. I am a Vrul."

"Oh, I've heard about your species. You're the ones who only work one job their entire lives, supposed to be geniuses, all logical and scientific.... like Vulcans."

"Like what?"

"Uh, never mind," the he muttered. The bandage had unraveled in a long, dangling strip that hung towards the floor. There was no blood, but the bandage was stained yellow from some unknown fluid. Finally, the bandage was off leaving only the gauze. Whoever had put the thing on had done a pretty damn good job. Not a hint of light was leaking through.

The doctor reached up and plucked at the edges of the adhesive pulling the blood-stained gauze from his face.

He didn't see anything.

Reflexively, he reach up to feel his eye. Perhaps it was swollen shut, but the doctor brusquely slapped his hand away, "No touching! I have read your biological map; absolutely covered in a biome of germs, and now you want to go and touch an open wound!"

The alien doc sucked at bedside manners. He must be an exceptional surgeon, but that wasn't what concerned him right now.

Captain Vir lowered his hand, but inside his heart began to pound even harder, "Why can't I see?"

The little doctor did not pause in his examination, "Your eye was destroyed during the accident. I was able to save some of the optic nerve while removing the object without damaging the brain. The eye was unsalvageable. I anticipate you will have more issues from the missing eye than you will from any brain damage, which is absolutely ridiculous for me to even be saying."

The doctor continued talking, but Captain Vir didn't hear him. If he had been standing on the floor, it would have fallen out from under him. Even so, the room around him began to spin, and his entire body went completely cold.

He needed that eye! He couldn't be a pilot without it! He could be discharged! His career could be over! He had only been captain for less than a year!

His stomach churned, nausea building up in his throat, which had been constricted under the power of what felt like a steel vice. The next breath that escaped his throat was somewhere between a gasp and a whimper. He cursed the unlucky injury had destroyed his eye and possibly his future plans. He felt as if he couldn't breathe or, truth be told, didn't want to.

The doctor pulled back in alarm, probing at his neck for a pulse. Captain Vir tried to pull away against the strange touch of the unfeeling alien. He just needed... some time to think this through. He tried taking long, deep breaths to slow his heart squeezing his eyes shut. It felt strange not having an eye for his lid to close over.

When he finally opened his eyes, he found the alien staring at him in worried confusion, hands raised as if he wasn't entirely sure what to do. "Are you having some sort of attack, human?" he asked.

The captain shook his head, "No I... I'm fine."

"You don't look fine."

"That's because I am missing an eye!" He didn't intend to raise his voice, but he could not control it. The doctor floated away and though the doc's face remained neutral, Vir could feel the alien's fear. That didn't matter as his breath became more ragged and uncontrolled, his voice raspy, quivering, "M-my career is over."

The little doctor stared at him with a blank, uncomprehending expression, "What brought you to that conclusion?"

Vir would have liked to have taken the news stoically: like the heroes in the old movies would have, like his idols, like his father, but even now, he was fighting to keep his voice calm. "You don't get it," he said shaking his head emphatically, voice cracking. "They'll discharge me... I... I don't know how to do anything else." What would he do? And what would happen to his mission?

He had to get up, had to figure out where to go from here.

He struggled against the gravity field his breath coming in short gasps, but no matter how much he moved, he simply floundered in place.

The doctor had backed up at his panicked reaction. "Stop struggling," he implored.

"You do not understand." He tried even harder to reach the leads in an attempt to pull them from his arms and chest.

He had to-

"Since you will not calm down, I must insist on intervening."

He turned his head eye widening in surprise as he watched the doctor openly inject something into his IV. He tried to reach out and grab the tube, but mid-way through the movement his arm went numb. He flailed about for a bit head lolling losing control of his body.

His vision swam, "You don't get it," he slurred, "Without my eye, I lose everything."

The little creature turned to face him now, its umber-tinted orange eyes flashing with the ghosts of the blue light cast from the overhead strips, "Then get a new eye."

His argument caught in his throat. His vision spun, "What?"

The doctor returned to examining the wound as his head lolled drunkenly, "I said, get a new eye. I noticed you have an analogue leg and if you can survive without a leg, I am going to make the logical leap that your species can probably survive with analogue eyes as well."

The doctor seemed to stretch and elongate as his vision warped, and then faded.

Fake eye.

He hadn't even thought of that...

Maybe his career wasn't over after all.

All of a sudden, he was having trouble caring about his missing eye. He spun downwards into the blackness of the drugs as it filled him with a warm honey glow, like a sunlit afternoon in summer before he faded away.

15 years earlier

A warm breeze drifted through the open window causing the lacey, white curtains to shiver gently from its careless caress bringing with it the distant sound of rhythmic sprinklers along with the calming, earthy smell of freshly cut grass.

Over the sound of the sprinklers, the voices of children swelled as they approached from down the street. Happy laughter echoed off the houses fanned by the simple freedom of a Friday afternoon and the short reprieve from confined classroom walls.

In the front yard, the noise of an engine rose to a slight purring as the automated lawn-bot began its careful patterned trek to create a precisely manicured front lawn.

Inside the warm, sunny confines of the house, an automated wash-bot lightly scrubbed a soiled pan dunking it into the sink once or twice before drying. Not a few feet away, bent low over the dining room table, a slim woman --in a pair of baggy pants and a work flannel-- maneuvered a piece of denim through a sewing computer. The light whirr of the machine could barely be heard over the sound of the house bots. A thin ringlet of blond hair looped onto her shoulder, and she paused to brush it idly away sleeves rolled up to elbow, tongue stuck delicately in between her teeth as she worked.

Martha Vir had originally received her Ph.D in global history with a focus on the post-cold war era and the information age, however when teaching history lost its appeal, she started her own business recreating, and helping others to recreate, historically accurate period-clothing.

The modern world, and even long before that, had experienced cycling trends in fashion, which saw resurgence in styles long past. She herself enjoyed the simple provincial fashion of the early to mid-21st century, which had a focus on jeans, in a myriad of styles, and the flannel of the Welsh farmer adopted and popularized by the American fashion industry during that era.

Her thoughts drifted back to her work, as she folded the garment and began disassembling her sewing kit, disconnecting the power cell, and fitting its pieces snuggly in the contoured case.

She could have programmed her computer to do it all of course but, there was nothing more satisfying than making something with her own hands. She finished packing her equipment and was just folding up her squares of fabric when the front door burst open only to slam shut immediately after. The sudden noise startled her, and she knocked the sturdy kit with a flailing elbow causing a shooting pain to spike up and down her arm.

"Shoot!" She exclaimed rubbing her arm vigorously before turning towards the closed door. The drawer on the side table was still rattling from the violent crash, though there was no one in sight. She stood straight adjusting her fly-away hair before turning to the wall, "Prism, what time is it?"

The glowing strip of blue light that ran around the upper edge of the living room blinked to life and responded in a pleasingly ambiguous voice, "It is currently 3:20 pm Friday, May 16th."

"Thank you, Prism," she said absently, placing her kit back on the table before walking into the hallway. Three of the four doorways were closed leaving the area cool and shaded; however, a single strip of golden light cut through a crack from under one of the doorways illuminating a small portion of the hallway.

She stepped up to the door knocking gently against the familiar, aged wood as she simultaneously pushed the door inward, "Adam ... sweetheart, is everything ok?"

She already knew the answer.

Her youngest son was sprawled flat on his bed, face down disheveled blond hair sticking chaotically in all directions. His oversized sneakers hung over the side of the bed, floppy, untied laces dangling towards the floor. As small and thin as he was, his large, black t-shirt and baggy cargo shorts seemed to absolutely engulf him. His thin shoulders shook silently.

He didn't answer her, but simply lay there with his head tucked under the crook of his elbow. She quietly took a seat next to the still form admiring the eclectic nature her little boy's room. He would talk when he was ready.

The room could have been a museum of NASA and popular science fiction for the past two thousand years. Faces-- many of them long dead-- some over two thousand years gone, stared down from the walls immortalized in reproduced holo-images and vintage posters.

If it involved an alien you could be sure that her son had searched for it, seen it, studied it, and become a fan of it. It didn't matter when the book had been written, when the movie had been produced, or the documentary aired; he knew it all.

Evidence of the young boy's obsession littered the desks and shelves with hand-painted figurines, moon rocks, jars of Mars sand and towers of drawings yet to find their place on the already-cluttered walls.

Concerned gray-blue eyes glanced over at the small figure noting, with satisfaction, that the shaking had died down to the occasional spasm. She reached over a gentle hand placing it on his back between the shivering shoulder blades, "Are those kids being ignorant again?"

"T-they j-just d-don't get it!"

She furrowed her face in sympathy as he struggled to push the words out past his uncooperative diaphragm and its sporadic bursts of air. Growing frustrated with his unintelligibility, he sat up. His round cheeks were puffy, and his large, green eyes were still filled with unshed tears as he struggled to control his own body.

"T-they w-wont listen to me... I s-s-said that mathematical probability s-says that there are aliens, but t-they told me that even t-two thousand years ago they didn't believe in aliens."

Martha frowned, "Well, that's not true at all. Scientists of the day thought it might be very likely." 

"I- I tried to tell them that! B-but they just w-won't listen. B-billions of galaxies, trillions of stars and- and they think we are the only ones. Then they said that if there were aliens then they would have at least found Voyager 1 and contacted us, but mom Voyager is only like 691billion 891million 200 thousand miles from earth. That isn't even a light year!"

She gently patted his shoulder, "Inside voice please."

He sniffed, "The c-closest stars to us are Alpha Centauri A and B which are 4.3 lightyears from Earth, and and their only possibly habitable planet is Proxima B and it's tidally locked with their star making life unlikely; plus they would have to find Voyager first."

She sighed past an affectionate smile and pulled him a little closer to rest against her shoulder. She kissed the top of his head, "You are one remarkable kid; you know that?"

He sniffed. "You're just saying that 'cause you're my mom," he said, voice muffled partially by her shirt.

She frowned pulling back to look at him. By now his tears had dried leaving streaks down his cheeks and a dull redness to his otherwise bright green eyes. She brushed back a stray strand of straw-blond hair only to frown again when it stuck back up, "Adam, what is our one rule in this house?"

He looked down for the longest moment, and then with a long extended sigh he answered, "Mom is always right...."

She smiled smugly and ruffled his hair, "That's right, and never forget it." She grew serious, "besides you're my son, so how could you be anything other than intelligent, incredible, and awesome?"

That coaxed a smile from his tight lips as she pulled him playfully closer and didn't stop, not until she had transformed the smile into a proper laugh: like all good mothers she was an alchemist of emotion. He wriggled from her arms only to collapse onto the mattress panting heavily from laughter.

She felt the smile stretch the corners of her mouth which throbbed from overuse. With a deep sigh, she got up and walked over to the curtains pulling them shut cutting off the stream of honey golden light and kicking up the lazy dust motes into a micro-whirlwind. Her son looked up from the bed wide green eyes scrunched in confusion, but she kept silent walking over to the bed and falling to lay next to him staring up at the ceiling, "Prism, activate the Projector."

At her command, the entire room suddenly erupted into a condensed micro-universe of trailing stars, swirling nebulae. and spiral galaxies. She reached up, dragging her hand through an arm of the Milky-Way causing stars to erupt around her fingers, spill outwards, and then form back together. She held her hand still allowing the last of the stars to trickle off her fingertips like droplets of water. Turning her head, she looked to find a copy of that universe reflected back at her from the surface of those wide, green eyes.

She reached out taking his smaller hand in hers, "Adam."

"Yeah, mom?"

She turned her eyes back towards the floating specks, "One day, when you're older, you'll get to see all of this for yourself," she squeezed his hand tight in hers.

"You'll prove them wrong."

Waking up the second time could only be equated to trying to crawl up a sand dune wearing lead boots. His throat was coated in sandpaper, his single eye was glued shut, and his own breath tasted like Satan himself had crawled down his throat and died. When he finally managed to pull himself into some groggy semblance of wakefulness, he immediately wished that he hadn't. Whatever kind of alien drug they had him on, it was absolute garbage: zero out of ten, would not recommend. He considered petitioning for a suggestion box to urge them never use this drug ever again on anyone ever. He wondered if he was the first human to experience this poison masquerading as medicine and vowed to let the doc know that they could take some lessons from the pharmaceutical companies on Earth. He has been drugged before and with results almost worth repeating.

Smacking his lips together in a useless attempt to scour away the mouthful of nasty, he peeled his one eyelid from the cement gunk and glanced groggily about the room. He didn't see a thing as blurry as his vision was. All the action did was serve to remind him that he was missing an eye.

His heart fell.

He reached a hand up to feel the bandage, fingers trembling a bit as they traced over the fibrous surface.

He drew in a long, deep breath.

His life had suddenly become a lot more complicated.

"It's good to see you awake, Captain,"

He jolted upright, eyes wide and wild as the world around him suddenly solidified in his one remaining eye.

The drug addled weariness fell from him like a cloak as he turned to find the source of the noise and was surprised to find his first lieutenant, his navigations officer, and one of his good friends Corporal Ramirez all sitting by his bedside.

They smiled, the lieutenant resting a hand on his shoulder, her warm, dark eyes wide with concern.

He blinked, "What ..."

"Embarrassed to say we were a little worried," his first lieutenant said, her deep, refined voice easily filling the room despite its perceived softness, "How are you feeling?"

He blinked a few more times trying to compose himself to their unexpected presence. He forced a reluctant smile to tug at the corners of his mouth all too aware of their eyes which remained affixed on the bandages over his eye. He searched for the words, "Well ... my ... eye is ... gone, but the doctor says the damage to the brain was...well he said it was the best outcome they could have hoped for with an injury like this."

The room fell into an awkward silence.

He looked away.

He didn't like the way they were staring; he could feel the pity like heat radiating from a fire. It reminded him too much of when he had lost his leg during the war, and that wasn't a memory he was fond of reliving.

Silence pervaded the room: awkward, nervous silence.

The tainted atmosphere didn't last as it was shattered explosively moments later by peals of ruckus laughter. With the awkwardness decapitated --leaving only complete and utter confusion in its wake-- the group turned to look for the source of the interruption. Furrowed brows found their resident marine grinning now grinning from ear to ear. Not stopping there, Ramirez cut the space between them and clapped the captain roughly on the arm shaking him until he was legitimately concerned that his remaining eye would jounce out of his skull and onto the floor.

"You glorious bastard," he laughed, head tilting back towards the ceiling. "You absolute madman!" He stepped back with a grin.

Captain Vir's brows furrowed in consternation, but he didn't have long to think before the marine grew serious, leaning in conspiratorially, while the other two looked on in bemused confusion, "You know what this means, don't you?"

Raising an eyebrow in mild amusement, he humored the marine, "No, what does this mean?"

"You're a pirate, a space pirate!" The marine laughed again, stepping back to motion down towards him with a wide sweeping gesture of the hand. "Missing an eye, missing a leg, the captain of a space ship..." he opened his hands wide above his head as if words would appear there in glowing neon, "Space pirate."

His laughter was contagious, and the Captain found a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. Space pirate, he kind of liked the sound of that.

"And to go along with your new title," the marine announced, "the boys and I got you a little something special."

"Oh?" he wondered aloud, glancing over at his other visitors who just shrugged at him apparently unaware of what the marine had planned. The soldier just grinned at them, reaching slowly and with much ceremony. From behind his back, he produced --with a grand flourish-- a dangling strip of molded leather which swayed from his fingers.

"Is that an eyepatch?" The captain exclaimed unsure whether to laugh or to order the marine out of his sight.

"Hell yeah, it's an eyepatch! Who the hell loses an eye and doesn't get an eyepatch? I mean, in my opinion, any one-eyed person who doesn't have one is doing it wrong and seriously needs to reconsider his life choices."

The captain just shook his head in bewilderment as the marine grinned at him shiny, leather strip dangling in the air between them. The other three stared, all hovering on the razor's edge of amusement and awkwardness.

The way he reacted would potentially shape the way his crew saw him. Not even half a year into their original mission and he had already lost an eye, but would accepting this improve or tarnish his position as their Captain?

Just as the moment was beginning to lean towards the awkward, he reached out and motioned to the marine, "Well come on; help a cripple put the damn thing on. Just take off the bandages, I'm sure it'll be fine."

He couldn't help but feel the small shock of self-consciousness that rocketed through him as the marine began to unwind the bandages, but he shook it off. He had made his decision, and come hell or high water he was going to see this through.

He felt rather than saw the last bandages come off, and heard the murmur of surprise from around the room.

"Damn!" Ramirez muttered, "That is one bad ass battle wound." With a little help from the marine he got the strap over his head, and the patch fit over the missing eye. He gently shook himself, a little bit like a dog, to settle the strap into place and then looked up, "So, how do I look?"

The crew members peered at him with expressions ranging from thoughtful to amused. The first lieutenant approved, "It's a good look on you captain.

"Roguish," grinned the marine.

"Definitely getting a protagonist with a tragic backstory vibe," the navigations specialist nodded.

He wasn't entirely sure if they were jesting or not. Their straight faces said one thing, but his instincts said another. However, after a moment of deliberation, he determined that they were being serious with him, and he left the patch on as the marine stepped away nodding.

He allowed his smile to linger for a few more seconds before letting if fall, "Any word on our mission?"

"No sir, but, to be fair we were more worried about you."

The captain grunted, "That's fine. I wanted to do a little exploring anyway."


	3. Chapter 3

Note, Chalan = Sunny in the Drev language 

Theoretically, a human can survive in the vacuum of space for approximately 15 seconds before passing out from oxygen loss through the blood.

This fact assumes that the human has evacuated all the air from their lungs PRIOR to exposure to vacuum conditions

Chalan felt the cold steel of the spear in her upper left hand, and when she flexed it, she could feel the pressure of the spear as it bore down on all four fingers.

She closed her eyes and tilted her head: listening to the distant sounds of the alien launch field. She could feel it too: the rumbling of their powerful engines thrumming through the ground and into her set of lower hands, which she had rested on the mossy stone beneath her.

Something soft brushed against her cheek, and she opened her eyes glancing up at the sky where large flakes of ash were beginning to slowly drift from the darkened atmosphere.

She would have to move quickly. The dark season had come early this year, and the face of Anin would soon be covered in great clouds of billowing ash, which would blot out the sun and turn the land cold.

No ships would enter their atmosphere then, for fear of complete engine failure.

Now would be her only chance.

Chalan closed her eyes again pushing her back up against a blue-grey and white striped coiltree. It wasn’t a big tree, but it wasn’t a sapling either, and its spiraling branches protected her from the worst of the ash fall.

Delicate white petals glowed in the darkness about her feet. The tree had began to shed its petals leaving only the mummified corpses of the coiltree berries dried and clinging to the branches overhead.

“Ready yourself! We have no time for weakness.”

Chalan opened her eyes slowly looking up at the looming figure above her.

General Kasna glared down at her through the slowly falling ash, her narrowed golden eyes glittering like the fires on the distant volcanic horizon.

Using her spear, Chalan dragged herself to her feet drawing her ragged cloak tighter around her shoulders. Overhead Kasna’s imposing shadow weighed heavy on Chalan’s shoulders.

Chalan had born the weight of her mother’s shadow all her life, at only seven feet tall compared to her mother’s nearly eleven feet, that was only to be expected.

General Kasna stepped forward through the darkness, and Chalan followed after, the two of them hunched low against the horizon for fear of being seen. Though, Chalan was not convinced her mother was capable of feeling fear. As the longest standing General of the mightiest Drev clan on Anin, General Kasna did not doubt, nor did she fear anything – a fact which made Chalan’s failures as her daughter all the more poignant.

Drev were supposed to be tall, with colorful carapace, and a talent for fighting. And while Chalan was colorful, sheathed in a striking lightning blue carapace, she had always been small -- embarrassingly so: a fact which led to disadvantages on the battlefield where her clan and ancestors cut their teeth and proved their worth.

Together, the two Drev warriors cut across the landscape feeling their way over the colorful moss discolored by darkness. Chalan could feel the slowly accumulating ash slick and warm between her two-toed feet.

She followed her mother’s shadow, a hulking figure of darkness just deeper than the surrounding landscape. The Drev shape consisted of: two two-toed feet, the toes on which they walked and a heel rising into the air, knees bent forward connecting into large powerful thighs and a thick trunk, two sets of arms extending from either side of the chest one positioned just above the other, the lower arms slightly smaller than the upper and a thick neck connected an almost birdlike head to the body.

It was surprising that no one had discovered them as big and bulky as Kasna was. Not to mention, Drev were not known for their stealth capabilities as they tall and colorful due to the brightly pigmented carapace on their feet, thighs, chests, shoulders, forearms, and heads. The carapace on their heads running from the point of their beak-like snout over the crest of their heads to end in two hard ridges just at the base of the skull.

The pair came to another stop, softly kneeling on the ground just below a short hillock and closer to the launch area. Chalan felt a soggy dampness under her knee, and looked down to find she had landed on a partially rotted orb-fruit. She made a face in the darkness.

Beside her General Kasna’s carapace almost blended in with the night: a mesmerizing royal purple washed with areas of blue and speckled with tones of light purple. It would have blended beautifully with the night sky had the night sky been visible.

General Kasna checked over the next hillock, and satisfied they had not been spotted she turned to look at Chalan.

“You are ready?”

“Yes, mother.”

Her eyes narrowed, “If you fail, I will not come for you.”

“I know, mother.”

“General!”

Chalan lowered her head, “Yes, General.”

“You will find your way to the human, you will bring him here - to me.”

“Yes, General.”

Chalan was shocked and surprised as General Kasna grabbed her by the front of the cloak and hauled her forward. Chalan nearly fumbled the spear through her ashy fingertips, but managed to catch it at the last instant.

“You will not fail me.”

She shook her head vigorously.

General Kasna let her go dropping Chalan to the ground with all the ceremony of a boulder rolling form a cliff.

“Perhaps –if your mission succeeds—you will finally have proven why I kept you all those years ago.”

Chalan lifted her head mouth clamped silently

“Now go!”

Chalan did not need a second urging, and with a step she raced into the darkness keeping her body low against the ground as she approached the bright lights of the launch field.

This was not the first time Chalan had done this, though her mother did not know, and Chalan would never tell. Better that her brother remained dead in the eyes of the clan, than be seen as a coward and an outcast for running away.

And now, here she was again plotting to board one of those outbound ships, like her brother had done all those months ago.

Kasna may have regretted keeping her, but Chalan did not regret helping him.

She had no regrets.

***

21 years ago

The city held no more than five hundred inhabitants: a cluster of squat single-room dwellings set like the spokes of a wheel around a large central cathedral hewn from the rough volcanic stone. Despite the primitive, almost tribal nature of the huts and the surrounding land, hints of an advanced society still poked at the corner of consciousness.

Tall figures stood about the edge of the village just within sight of each other as they stared into night, ever watchful. Each of these watchers stood regaled in plated armor and carrying long steel spears sometimes 14 to 17 feet in length

The primitive design of the armor and weapons belied the strength and power of the metal working: delicate designs and patterns precisely smelted over finely crafted steel alloys, lighter and stronger than they had any right to be. Thin veins of subtle blue light seeped through the fissures in their armor, the only hint of concealed power cells.

The watchers were motionless until a disturbance on the far end of the village broke the chain, and two of the warriors turned, weapons thudding into soft moss.

Together, they lowered their heads in deference, “General,” one of them murmured, voice carrying softly through the night.

In the moment between exchanges, there was nothing but the distant huffing of the volcanoes roaring at the edge of earshot.

“Protectors,” she said. In the silence, and with her softest voice the words were still harsh like the crack of an unseen whip compelling the two guards to flinch before bowing even lower.

A warm night breeze blew past them from the volcano bringing with it the distinct smell of sulfur. “Keep watching with the night,” she commanded in that same soft voice, “for it will be long.” Sensing something strange on the air, the soldiers suddenly noted her lack of armor, and the subtle thickening about her middle. Bowing with even greater difference than before, they backed away allowing her to pass softly into the night.

The sky above her was stony and shadowy, bleakly casting the light of the two waning moons down upon her as she trekked over the soft moss and volcanic stone, a single figure highlighted against the inky void.

She wore no armor to protect her from the dangers of the volcanic lands. This was not the occasion for armor, and she would not reject the traditions of her ancestors.

For the greater part of the journey, she walked without ceasing her back straight and her head held high, but the further she went, the slower she moved as her legs strained to climb the low-lying hills, which lay just before the fiery border. At times she stopped abruptly as roiling, jagged pains washed through her nearly bringing her to her knees. But despite her pain, she kept climbing and clawing her way up and over jagged stone. The heat grew more intense as she grew closer to the fire, finally coming to a stop bathed in the glow of the volcanic firelight. The pain started radiating in rhythmic time. Trying to stave off the agony as long as she could, she walked in a circle curling over every now and again keening, sweating and gasping.

Suddenly she found herself on her knees, back arched from the pain. She felt her breath being stolen from her as the agony increased exponentially. She drew in a great heaving breath and released a primal scream toward the sky, her war cry trying to alleviate her pain. She screamed again clawing at the stone beneath her fingers, her voice powerful enough to match the roaring of the fire, which now bathed her in blistering heat. She strained forward panting for air.

Only once had she known a pain so great but never in battle, and this time it was a solitary battle as each wave of agony and suffering relentlessly crashed over and into her. She was alone, and, yet she fought for two lives under an unsympathetic sky above and a mocking fire to her side.

With one last scream that threatened to tear her apart, she was released from her pain and she sagged over her knees on the blazing stone arms and legs trembling uncontrollably from her extended effort. She closed her eyes anxiously waiting and was rewarded almost immediately by a soft sound barely audible over the roaring of the fire.

General Kasna reached down, large hand cradling the creature’s as to shield and protect it.

General Kasna’s breath caught and her eyes widened…no…no…no.

The tiny, slippery creature wriggled and swayed blindly in the general’s hands, its exposed grey skin tinted a light peach. Its tiny eyes were shut tight, and its delicate little beak opened and closed in reproach, its cries unheard over the roaring of the fire as its limbs flapped sporadically. What carapace it had, as young as it was, was a delicate powder blue, reflecting the auburn of the nearby fire.

But that was not the problem.

It was tiny.

A runt.

A weak, pathetic...

Kasna felt her insides go cold despite the fire that warmed her skin. She stared at the insignificant creature in her arms as it kicked and struggled.

Tradition and culture had brought her into the hills alone to allow the spirits to guide her fate: either mother and kit would be strong and survive, or they would be lost. But this, this could not have been worse, for they had both survived, yet tradition remained strong.

The kit was not acceptable.

Standing and boldly lifting her head, General Kasna stepped towards the edge of the fiery precipice holding the tiny kit in her arms as it struggled, crying out against the super-heated updraft that washed over them. The fire below was deafening and scorching.

She held the kit forward staring down at the molten river below her.

With a determined effort, Gerneral Kasna extended her arm and the kit over the fire. Tradition demanded the sacrifice of the weak, and Kasna would not defy tradition.

General Kasna went to reach out her hands and the newborn kit within, but…. No!

Stumbling away from the edge of the cliff, Kasna fell to her knees on the feverish stone. The kit continued to whimper in her hands.

She clutched the kit to her chest, “Why couldn’t you have been bigger?” she anguished nearly choking on her own grief, rocking absently back and forth atop the burning rock. She knelt there for an eternity just rocking and holding the coveted kit against her chest feeling it squirm and wriggle, but she could not look down as its size repulsed her.

She turned her head towards the fire, a struggle raging within herself.

No!

Clutching the tiny body to her chest, she fled from the edge and was halfway down the hill before she slowed. She could hear the kit’s cry now, a high pitched keening that was surprisingly strong despite the size. She looked down at the tiny face, and grasping hands. This was her blood her offspring; this was what she had wanted. All Drev matriarchs of her age and status had at least six to seven to comprise their warring broods. However, after her first: now a strong and vigorous juvenile, her and her mate had struggled and failed time after time to produce a second. She had lost many, carried some almost to term before her body rejected them. She felt her back bow under a mental agony and longing that could not be rivaled even by the pain of birth.

She stopped. She had to sacrifice it, had to give it back to the spirits allowing it to be recycled back into the life-circle so that it might come back stronger.

She has sacrificed so much for this clan. She had conquered the ten warring tribes of the east and accepted their submission. She had lead their armies south and north in a campaign of conquest and domination that brought them the most fertile lands, and the largest holdings. How could she be cursed with an inability to produce young!

Why had the spirits ignored her efforts? Why had they punished her so? After all she had done, how could they gift her a kit she could not keep? Surely, they did not expect her to give it up?

She raged at the sky, and the kit screamed with her. The power in its lungs made her question tradition and custom. It was strong; perhaps its size would not matter. A small child was hardly a problem if it could grow and develop into a strong warrior

General Kasna sat on the rocks, the soreness and tiredness of her body fading like an ember while the agony in her soul raged like the fires in the volcano. She knew what her options were, she knew what tradition demanded, and she knew that she just couldn’t do it… she couldn’t.

She staggered to her feet.

Wearily she stepped further and further from the fires. “Why do the spirits curse us so?”

It would have been better if she had lost her young, better if it had been born lifeless and blue, better even if it had been born deformed so that she would know the spirits did not mean for her to keep this abomination. She could cast it into the fire and back to the spirits without tearing at her feelings.

She cursed her own weakness.

But she convinced herself that she wasn’t weak. Strength had been given to the kit by the spirits and the kit had been given to her by the spirits. They were either challenging her or expecting something of her.

Kasna braced herself.

She would make it worthy.

-

The small, austere dwelling occupied a place at the center of the city just across from the wide, dark doors of the cathedral. Under the distant covering of ash and cloud, their star was tinted red, casting the land in a bloody haze. It was a poor day for war or even for training, but still the morning grew with the sounds of warriors marching. Standing outside in the early morning light, General Lanus gazed west.

He held firm against the approaching dawn as red light from the rising sun shattered off his golden carapace and spilled down his hide.

He wore no armor, for that would not do, as today he would take on a completely different battle. Despite his anxieties, he remained stoic and made no show of the worry that plagued his heart. Somehow, he felt this would be their last chance. If they could not produce a viable offspring this time, then they never would. A quick glance to the south brought thoughts of their only son, surely out training in the early morning mist.

His nerves rose with the sun, and he began to wonder if his mate would ever return from her lonely venture to the volcanic edge, but even as he conjured that thought, a shadow passed through the mist and resolved into a tall-dazzling form. Though he could sense the exhaustion in her step, she walked with all the pride of a true warrior.

But no... something was wrong.

She strode from the fog refusing to make eye contact with him as she released something into his arms and then stepped inside shutting the door behind her with a soft thud. He looked after her with confusion and deep concern. He took a step to follow, but was caught off guard by a quiet chirp. He paused with his foot mid-air looking down to find a tiny face staring up at him, and for a moment, his heart seemed to soar before being dashed back to the ground.

She was so very small.

Glancing towards the closed door, he knew what had happened, but he was not entirely sure why it had happened. Kasna had not followed the tradition.

He couldn’t blame her.

Looking down at the undersized kit curled in his arms, he knew that he wouldn’t have been able to do it either. Tenderly, he reached out a finger, tracing a claw tip down the tiny cheek.

He had only felt a love like this once before.

Lifting his regal head, he stared over the horizon in contemplation. He would find a proper name for her, as was his want and his right as the male half of this battle pair.

Something traditional he though, something to invoke the power of the spirits that watched over them.

The clouds parted above, and a beam of golden light cut through the sky spearing the land with a shaft of glittering particles of ash.

Softly, in his most reverent whisper he said, “And may this name invoke in you the strength of the sun spirit itself.... Chalan.”

***

Chalan crept over the hot ground steading her rucksack with one of her lower hands so it wouldn’t bounce against her hard carapace bringing with it an audible scratching.

She considered turning back a few times, but the thought of what she would face if she failed drove her forward; dying or being captured was preferable to facing her mother.

Besides, her brother had done this before her, and he was at least four feet taller than she.

Light swept over the moss field before her, illuminating the darkened ground into rainbows of color: mosses in turquoise, purple, pink, and green. She dropped to her belly on the moss and pressed her face into it. From this point on there was no turning back.

Chalan glanced back convinced that she could see the dark hunching shape of her mother watching intently from beside a distant coiltree, either that or it was simply just another large boulder, and her mind was playing tricks.

Turning her head to face forward again, she rolled to the side and low crawled on her belly over the moss to the very edge of the launch field. Moss deformed under her hands as she low crawled to the tarmac keeping one of the large floodlights between her and the scurrying forms of a hundred or more strange, alien shapes.

She used the cover of the light to slink the rest of the way behind a tower of crates.

She pressed her back against them and peered around the corner before rocking back into place breath held as she waited for an alarm to sound.

There was nothing.

She took a deep sigh and crouched there in the darkness.

This was good.

She knew where she was, and she knew where they were. The ship’s boarding ramp was maybe fifty yards from her current position.

Fifty yards of open ground she was going to have to cover.

She slowly inched down the line of crates before peering around the second corner, careful with her movement and steps.

The ground before her was awash with a blue glow, the stone and metal of the launch field and ships reflected light in every direction. Activity was high as large pallets of stone were being boxed into even larger crates. Mining crafts, some larger than the small hills around her city, rested, cued at the sides of the tarmac waiting to be unloaded.

In the distance, behind the idling of the large engines, she could hear the remote rattling of mining equipment as they plowed into Anin’s surface.

“Not a bad haul.”

Chalan ducked back behind her crate pressing her back against the cold metal just as two shadows approached her.

In her ear, the universal translator buzzed and then clicked off. She would have cursed except she was trying to stay quiet, and was forced to flick the thing back to life.

The shadows paused near her, their conversation continuing with the same alien warble she recognized from the war.

Tesraki.

“Any trouble with the local clans?”

“No, they are keeping with the treaty.”

“No suspected sabotage or-“

“No, our surveillance has not observed any but I can’t say they are particularly happy as we have ‘loosed the soil of ancient battlegrounds.” They’ll get over it.”

The shapes moved from their position slowly walking in the other direction.

“They cannot complain. It’s what they deserve for steeling GA property and murdering over three dozen delegates.”

The other voice grunted, “I don’t disagree, but no one deserves humans.”

Their voices were growing distant, and Chalan had to strain herself to hear what was being said next.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right: scary as hell but extremely valuable and useful. My uncle hired a few and…”

Their voices were lost over the rumbling of the engines though she caught a few phrases of their conversation through the rumbling.

“Haul that over here will you.”

“Watch your tail.”

“I better be getting paid good credit for this.”

“Ship leaving in twenty, get your things and get on.”

She crouched lower into the shadows and cursed. These Tesraki moved fast. She had no idea how was she supposed to get onto that ship.

“You two, start loading those crates onto the ship. We leave in less than twenty minutes, and I’m not going to be the one blamed for wasting time.”

“Sure boss.”

Chalan peered over the edge of the crate and immediately cursed as she caught sight of figures pacing in her direction. Her plan to stow away on the ship was ruined. It was no longer possible. She couldn’t go back. Desperately she glanced around as footsteps echoed louder.

Maybe…

the crates!

Moving quickly, she dropped her spear into her lower right hand and used her upper two hands to unlock the lid of the nearest crate. It opened with a soft hiss, and she winced slightly at the noise as she placed the lid just off to the side.

Peering down into the crate, she wasn’t exactly sure what she had come across. Reaching inside, she grabbed the contents, turning around she lobbed them into the darkness just behind the arc of the flood light. She quickly continued to empty the crate.

The footsteps were growing closer so she leaned her spear against the nearest crate to reach in with all four hands.

They were close now, just on the other side of the stack.

Chalan could hear them breathing and shuffling around.

“Someone get a hauler over here!”

She cursed, dusting her hands off before staring into the box.

Was it going to be big enough? Only one way to find out. Chalan reached back and grabbed her spear quickly breaking it down into its component parts. She had designed the weapon to do that herself, but she didn’t expect it to come in handy this early.

With both of her lower hands, she grabbed onto the remaining pieces of the spear, while, with her upper hands, she grabbed onto the lid of the crate.

She could feel a rumbling coming down the tarmac as it sent little vibrations through the ground and into her body. With frantic, but quiet speed she climbed into the box and pulled the lid over the opening. She grimaced to herself already knowing that this was going to be a tight fit if she wasn’t discovered in the next few minutes.

She leaned back into the crate kicking her legs up and ramming her shoulders back. She lowered her head, the chin of her snout-beak resting almost flat against her neck. Hot air puffed up from the breathing holes just above her collarbones sending great breaths of steamy moisture into her face.

Footsteps rounded the corner.

She cursed as she tried to seal lid in place but suddenly a sliver of light flickered through one open edge and cut across one of her eyes.

This was not good, not good at all.

Footsteps approached the crate, “Seven, eight, nine, ten. That’s ten of them here!”

A shadow passed over the lid of her crate, and she reached up with steady and silent hands pressing one set of her palms against the holes in her neck to silence the breathing she was sure had to be thundering through the crack in the crate and out into the ashen air. The second pair of hands came up to attack or defend, she wasn’t sure which.

“This can’t be right.”

The breathing drew closer.

“Of all the useless, negligent…this crate isn’t even properly sealed. Don’t you know how much this stuff is worth?” She heard his voice grow muffled as he turned his head away from her crate, “Seventy million! Seventy million and you left it open to the ash!”

Overhand, he heard the sharp hiss as the lid hissed shut.

It grew hot almost instantly. She suddenly realized her mistake as she felt for holes or gaps. If the seal was airtight she was going to suffocate and die. Her only comfort was that the creature who opened this crate would choke on the stench of her rotting corpse– if they even had noses.

She was such an idiot! She should have had contingencies. Nothing ever goes as planned in battle or reconnaissance. Chalan felt her chest tighten and had to close her eyes against the rising panic.

She was not claustrophobic, but dying of suffocation in a closed compartment was not part of the plan, and it did not seem like an easy way to go.

The rumbling of the machine approached as stronger vibrations ran through the ground and rattled her box. Voices rose and fading as they passed by her. She couldn’t understand anything as the sound of her own breathing echoed inside the enclosed space. She needed air.

The part of her that needed air violently warred with the part of her that wanted to complete the mission. The two sided fought valiantly, until the inside of the box was saturated with the condensation of her own breath, and the humidity was so stifling she was beginning to feel light headed. If she passed out inside the box, she was guaranteed she would die in it as well.

The machine’s roaring grew louder, so she took the opportunity to jam the tip of her spear into the crack under the box lid. She pulled down but only felt the metal warp and bend. The power was not enough. She needed a longer lever.

Head growing lighter and lighter by the minute, Chalan reached behind her back and grabbed a second peace of her spear twisting it onto the first. There was so little room inside the crate, but still, she pulled on her make shift lever, the panic rising up inside her.

With a slight hiss and pop, the lid finally split open a tiny bit as the seal cracked and split on one side.

She twisted the tip of the spear in the hole and was immediately awarded with a flood of cool night air and the opening enlarged. She gasped in relief, but was immediately jostled, her head ramming against a wall of the box.

The air pressure changed as she and the crate were lifted from the ground, swung around and placed atop a moving conveyance. Its slow movement sent vibrations through the crate rattling her eyeballs inside her skull.

The ride ended after climbing a lesser incline into what she could only guess was the cargo hold. She would have wagered to say that her assumptions were correct as the resonance of sound outside the box suddenly turned into that of a large cave. Voices and sounds bounced off the walls in a manner that amplified every noise into a cacophony of confusing and difficult sounds.

She was forced to withdraw her spear as voices approached, and her crate was once again hauled to one side and pushed into its final resting spot. She closed her eyes and prayed to the spirit of voyage that they wouldn’t pile more crates on top of her. One, she could handle, but two or three…?

At last, the movements stopped, and she was left alone curled inside the box listening to the hydraulic whirr of something in the distance. Voices shouted to each other and then faded. She couldn’t help but wonder how her brother had managed to make it off planet. She was certain he didn’t do it stuffed inside a crate.

Through the floor of the crate she felt the engines ignite, felt the powerful rumbling rising into her chest. Chalan had only experienced a feeling so powerful once in her life: watching from a distance as a massive rockslide thundered down a volcanic cliff-face. A moment later she discarded that comparison as the vibrating of the engines threatened to rattle her spirit from her body.

This was real power.

She and the contents of all the other crates were quickly flattened inside their enclosures as they surged up into the sky.

Locked inside the box, Chalan could only imagine the view, the dark side of her planet receding into a patchwork of darkness lit only by pinpricks of fire and glowing lakes of molten stone. Then the ash would eventually cover her vision leaving a dim glow behind, which would eventually be swallowed by blackness.

What would space be like?

Chalan could not be sure; she only had her imagination for reference now.

And what a poor reference it was to the awe she was soon to witness.


	4. Chapter 4

A human male by the name of Roy C. Sullivan remains the only being (human or otherwise) to be struck by lightning seven times, and survive. For reference, these bolts of atmospheric electricity are made up of around 100 million volts, 20,000 amps and can reach temperatures of 30,000 kelvin, hotter than the surface of many stars.

-

Dr. Krill performed his rounds that morning, like he did every morning, except with an uncharacteristic absentmindedness. During the course of his entire career, had he never made a mistake, but during those first few hours on the rotation floor, he almost unhooked a patient’s ventilator, and nearly stabbed another resident when startled by their sudden appearance.

With four independent cortical hemispheres, he still couldn’t focus on his attention on the tasks at hand.

It was that human again, all of the humans. He couldn’t stop thinking about them: fascination and fear combined into an unhealthy stew of obsession.

Everywhere he went, he was captivated -- or more correctly haunted -- by their eyes, how they stared at him from a depthless void, yet not lifeless or empty as the image had been which scared and puzzled him. He had to shake away the thought, though the feeling their eyes gave him was so visceral it was hard to forget. It was all probably just a product of his imagination—yet the Vrul were not well known for their imaginings.

It shouldn’t have captured his attention like it did, but here they were.

And despite all that, here he was doing everything but the one thing he wanted to be doing.

Was it out of fear?

Maybe.

He had accomplished much since he had accompanied the humans, but he could not put it off any longer.

Dr. Krill entered the human’s room with a modicum of agitation and apprehension. He wasn’t exactly sure what he expected to see, but something inside made him fear he might be forced to confront the depthless, blackness of the image from his office once again.

Off to his side, he could just make out the silhouette of the human shifting and churning where it lay. He immediately responded by filtering his vision through a thermal overlay, before immediately scolding himself for it and shutting it back off. Not only was the human unbearably bright with shedding heat, but there was no reason for him to feel so paranoid.

Floating forward into the room, he forced himself to look at the human directly. From this distance, he couldn't resolve all of the features, but could see that the creature was baring its teeth at him. He froze where he stood, rooted to the ground by his own gut wrenching fear. It cemented him in place, burrowed into his skin and spread like an insidious disease up his limbs. Had they neglected to feed it, was its insatiable lust for sustenance and hunger becoming too great for it to bear; had its animal mind taken over its rational mind?

Was it going to attack him?

“Um….. hey doc ... are you ok?” The innocuous question startled him from his mania more forcibly than rationality of any kind could have managed, and he oscillated in confusion at the center of the room. The human sat up, powerful dorsal muscles holding him upright. His teeth weren’t barred anymore as he leaned forward spine collapsing in a way that looked almost painful, nearly folded in half at the waist. He waved a hand in the air, “Hello, Earth to E.T is anyone home.”

“What?”

The human exhaled a sudden burst of air, “Never mind, I’m just wondering if you're alright. For a second there, it looked like you were going to cut and run.”

“I…. do not understand,” Krill ventured, inching tentatively closer.

“Mother of Jupiter,” the human trailed off lamely. “You look scared; are you ok?”

Oh, if that is what it had been trying to say all along it should have just gone and said it, though the fact that the human could sense his unease was cause for great concern. Could it smell his fear? Perhaps it could sense the chemical changes in his body.

“Do you often show your teeth?” he ventured, tentatively scooting a little closer.

The human blinked, “Show my teeth? I…. uh…. OH! Hmmm?” The human paused, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. In the past few days, a light dusting of fur had erupted from the creature’s skin stopping and starting in the strangest of places. As he rubbed, a strange scratching sound emanated from his hands.

“Like this?” spikes of bone passed into view glistening with a light coating of saliva glittering with the calming blue lights, now eerie under these circumstances.

Krill backed away.

The human waved a hand wildly, “Calm down doc, can you not smile on your planet?”

“Smile?”

The human did something strange with its single eye flashing the sclera at him momentarily as the iris rolled towards the top of the head, “Yeah, a smile. It is a way of greeting someone, a friendly gesture.” he waited for the doctor to process the information. “Humans smile at each other to greet people we like, like friends, or to show that we are happy. I believe it arose to show non-threatening intentions. I am greeting you.”

“Friends?” the Vrul ventured. He had only a fleeting understanding of the concept. He had heard a similar word used by the Tesraki and the Rundi and knew it had something to do with a close social bond.

“Yeah, friends. You saved my life, so friendship is the logical progression, don’t you think?”

Krill just shook his head. It didn’t seem particularly logical to him, but the human was strange, and much was still unknown about its behavior. To show amiability or harmlessness, the humans showed their bone protrusions -- interesting, in a backward way.

“Look, if you’re worried about the teeth thing I’ll stop, but so you know,the difference between good and bad expressions, I will give you a quick demonstration” The human paused and lowered his chin over the generally unprotected front of his neck. That was followed by his lips slow withdrawal across the slimy landscape of those bone protrusions. It was a similar expression to the one before it, but this one covered the neck, showed more teeth, and the way the brows cut across the eyes convinced the doctor that it would be quite prudent to make a hasty retreat.

“Doc, it’s just a demonstration. I’m not going to eat you…at least not yet….. kidding! Wow, doesn’t your species have a sense of humor?” Krill’s antenna hummed disapprovingly.

The human shook its large head, “I’ll take that as a no. Promise, humans don’t eat aliens.”

The doctor wasn’t sure if he believed that, but the human was smiling at him again, and he had to admit that the expression was significantly less distressing than he had originally supposed when compared to the second. So he made an executive decision and hesitantly approached to begin his examination. At first, he tried everything he could to avoid looking the human in the eye, though it wasn’t lost on him that his decision wasn’t practical considering the location of the human’s wound. Still, he stalled for as long as feasible before finally forcing himself to perform the exam.

When he did, he found himself immediately overcome with a sense of relief, though he couldn’t have said why. The eye appeared much the same as it had in the projected image, a delicately striated lattice of pigment in a striking Thallium green surrounding a contracting and expanding aperture of deep blackness. However, the inscrutable void he had experienced in his office was nowhere to be seen, and, as far as the doctor could tell, there was nothing visually different between the image and the real eye. Puzzling to say the least.

Rather than an actual physical change, it seemed to be the feelings the two evoked. Rather than staring into an endless abyss, he was filled with a sudden sense of life and warmth. There was nothing in the eye to indicate such feelings, but he was distinctly aware or assured that this creature was…alive, vibrant…and no matter how he tried to verbalize the feeling it gave him there was no way of explaining it. Of course the human was alive, but the depth of the consciousness was infinite.

Despite his relief, he was very displeased to find that the human’s bandages had been tampered with and an unsterilized item had been brought in contact with the wound. He scolded the human for what must have been a good two cycles, but his warnings either could not seem to keep the creature’s attention, or he simply didn’t care.

Dr. Krill tried to fight down his fascination and keep his interaction with the human strictly professional, but the more he interacted the more the fascination grew until he simply couldn’t contain himself and he heard himself, as if from a distance, interrupt the human and began asking his own questions. What planet housed their origins? How many sentient life forms inhabited their planet? What was the point of the fur on parts of their body? What was the reason for his coloring?

He stopped when he realized the human was smiling at him again. The delicate line of fur above the human’s eye raised, a surprising feat of dexterity, the muscles in the face must have been so complex!

“I’m afraid those aren’t questions I can answer doctor.”

The doctor hummed in displeasure, “Why not?”

The smile didn’t waver and it was well past any traditional greeting period Krill had ever heard of.

The human lifted its shoulders before slowly dropping them back, “I just can’t because although I can give you impersonal and mechanical answers, there are just some things you have to see and experience for yourself.”

“Experience it for myself?” the doctor wondered, “And how would I be expected to do that?”

The human sighed deeply, “I do have a suggestion, but I’m sure you wouldn’t be interested in my idea. Never mind, you’re not qualified as you have no experience with humans. Far above your skill level.”

The doctor was sure the human was goading him and, if that was the case, he was infuriated to find that it was working! “I very much doubt that human,” he found himself retorting with more indignation than he really intended, “as I have successfully performed surgery on you using an incomplete bio-map.”

The human’s smile grew bigger, more teeth, “You are correct doc. My ship's medical officer recently left under some unusual circumstances, and I have no one to look after my crew, so while we are in great need of a new medical officer, I am still not sure I would trust my human crew to your immature and amateur abilities.”

He didn’t know why that declaration bothered him so much, but it did, and upon hearing it, he clammed up even tighter than before.

He would not be goaded into a reaction by this creature. At least no more than he already had, so he regained his demeanor and finished examining the human in a strictly medical manner.

The human was significantly more active than he had been those first few days after his injury. He was also extremely talkative despite Krill’s sudden shutdown, and most of what he said was complete prattle to Krill. Although, he had access to a complete translation algorithm of the human language, Krill noticed that the human used many words that didn’t seem to exist in his own language, and when he did use words that Krill understood, he used them in ways that seemed contrary to their true meaning, which translated into complete nonsense.

Occasionally, the human would look at him as if waiting for a reaction only to flash another strange human expression: characterized by the sharp downturn at the corners of the mouth. The human wanted something but as with all Vrul, Krill expected and reacted to concrete communication. Bearing that in mind, the doctor tried to stay quiet, tried to stem the tide of questions flowing from his brain and towards his mouth so he could understand the human’s unspoken request.

His efforts were futile, and he broke just as the human was opening his mouth spew another rambling and disjointed thought.

“Is your language truly based this heavily on metaphorical and colloquial communication, or is this simply a product of personal acquisition, and if that is the case do all humans understand this terminology? How does new vernacular spread and how does one come to understand it? I-“

The human was smiling at him again, and the expression was still so alien and unnerving to Krill that he broke off and stopped his line of questioning.

“They weren’t kidding about your species being highly intelligent were they?”

“No,” Krill’s response wasn’t egoistic or anything, it was just a statement of fact.

“That reminds me, I never got your name.”

“Krill.”

“Just one name? No family name?”

“My species does not have family units. One name is all that is needed.” The human shifted in place, and Krill eyed him worried that the creature was going to try and get up.

“Got it, Spock.” When Krill did not react, the human flashed his sclera. “Never mind, tell me doctor, have you been practicing medicine your whole life?”

“Yes.”

“Really verbose, aren’t you?” The human muttered crossing his arms and leaning back against his pillows. “So, it would be safe to say that you are an experienced doctor?”

With his examination finished, Krill floated back deflating a bit to retrieve some fresh bandages, re-inflating and returning to apply the dressing, “I am.”

“How good are you? Good like chief of surgery for this hospital good or good like Dr. House is good?” Again, he had the feeling that there was something lost in translation, and the human sighed, “Note to self, stop using old pop culture references.”

Dr. Krill ignored the breaks in translation but deciphered the meaning. “You still have your brain function, but if that is insufficient evidence to answer your question, I have been commissioned the universe’s most skilled trauma surgeon for six consecutive cycles.”

The next expression the human made was one that unnerved the doctor greatly. If he could have describe it using a word, he would have said it was…hungry, though why that word sprung to mind was beyond him. Whatever it was, it caused a feeling that could only be described as a thousand bugs crawling over his skin.

“The best trauma surgeon in the known universe eh…. bet the surgeries get a little boring around here. I mean, if you’re as good as you say, things probably don’t surprise you much anymore.”

Dr. Krill glanced over at the human from where he stood next to the biohazard bin, but he didn’t say anything so the human continued. “You’re the best doctor in the known universe and you’re stuck at this safe station with barely a procedure to perform. Mine was the first brain surgery you have ever performed. On my planet we’ve been doing brain surgery for a couple thousand years now. Every surgeon and their dog has performed brain surgery.”

That definitely felt like bait of some kind, and he tried very, very hard not to take it; however, once again, his own infuriating curiosity betrayed him, “What do you mean, human?”

The human picked up his shoulders and they dropped them back into their original position. The expression on his face was infuriating, though once again, the doctor couldn’t determine exactly why, “We were doing brain surgery successfully before we invented the radio.”

Krill’s four cortical hemispheres experienced a simultaneous short out, and he found himself preparing to correct the human of his nonsense, but was interrupted.

“Yeah, you heard me, but I mean you guys invented rocket science before brain surgery. I suppose you guys can’t even transplant limbs or organs?”

Dr. Krill sputtered with confusion, and the human responded with a strange oscillating noise from the back of his throat and chest.

Krill stammered for a bit trying to find the proper words, “Transplant limbs, organs…human, now you are just fabricating medical procedures but to what end I cannot fathom.”

“No doc, we routinely use body parts from recently deceased people to fix the broken parts of sick or injured people. Generally, we prefer only reattaching people’s own limbs, but someone else’s will do in a pinch.” The ‘smile’ from earlier had grown even wider now. “But I’ll stop talking, you’re probably not interested. It’s not the kind of surgery you’re used to, human stuff you know, totally crazy, very dangerous. No non-human has never attempted the procedures that we do.”

The human had to be lying. It was the only explanation. Of course, the procedures were theoretically possible, yes, but highly improbable. To be able to reattach a limb the patient had to survive unthinkable trauma and shock, keep from bleeding to death, undergo surgery quickly, and once that was over, they had to survive the extensive surgery, fight off infection and accept the new tissue and survive through the recovery period.

“You are exaggerating.”

“Not exaggerating. Use logic doctor. I survived a screwdriver to the brain, and I have what five quarts of blood to loose. Humans are made to survive major injuries, but we can only do it when we have skilled doctors to bring us back.”

“I have a feeling you are trying to say something to me but doing it very poorly.” He was standing directly in front of the human now looking into his one, piercing, green eye. The pupil contracted and twitched down to look at Krill’s face.

The human tapped his fingers against the bedframe, “Alright, how about I make myself perfectly clear: no games, no hints, no playing around. If you are half as good as you say you are, you are wasting your talent here. The number one trauma surgeon in the known universe, and you have never actually dealt with a major trauma greater than what, a broken leg? What would you give for a possible opportunity to re-attach limbs, stitch organs back together, cut us open and see what’s on the inside.

The Vrul did not experience many emotions as their environment and civilization was so structured, predictable and rational.

“Go on.”

“You’re bored aren’t you, doing the same thing here day after day after day.”

Krill remained quiet; boredom was a word he did understand. It was when your intelligence or abilities weren’t stimulated or challenged enough, when the job you had was below your capabilities to perform.

“I’ll offer you a deal.”

Krill waited.

“Join my crew. Travel the galaxy, and I promise you, you will never know boredom ever again.”

Krill stared at the human.

The human stared back.

And then Krill turned around and walked out.

As the wall began to close behind him, he could just barely hear the human’s muttering, “A simple no would have been fine.”

The wall sealed behind him and Krill let his lateral antennae buzz in excitement.

Quit his job.

Join the human crew.

Wander the galaxy.

What a thought, what a trip, what an outrageous… idea.

What an... outrageous… idea


	5. Chapter 5

On December 10, 1954, a human by the name of Dr. John Paul Stapp volunteered for an experiment in which he was propelled horizontally down a track by nine rockets reaching the equivalent of 40,000 lbs. of thrust. During the experiment, he accelerated from standstill to 630 mph in five seconds reaching 20 Gs before coming to a complete stop within 1.4 seconds. During that time, he experienced the equivalent of 46.2 Gs and his body was estimated to have weighed around 7,000 lbs. at the point of greatest force. He survived the experiment with minor injuries including the complete hemorrhaging of both eyes, which he fully recovered from with only minor side effects.

Captain Vir peered out the doorway and into the hall. He was about 99.9% sure he was not supposed to be here and another 70% sure if the doctor found him, he would probably be sedated again. However, he was more than willing to take these risks. He was where he wanted to be after all… in a roundabout sort of way.

When he had pictured arriving on this planet, it had definitely been grand: descending from the heavens in glory backlit and silhouetted against the interior light of the ship when the docking ramp was lowered. He probably would have stood there for a few seconds, for dramatic effect, before finally walking down the ramp and greeting the dignitaries or welcoming party sent out to meet them.

It would have been pretty badass.

Instead, he had stumbled in bloody and incapacitated like some sort of jackass.

What kind of moron loses an eye?

Congenital defects and visual problems aside, but he was born with 20/10 vision and had never required glasses in his life. Now, he was fifty percent more blind than your average person, and, as a fighter pilot, that was kind of an issue. He was definitely riding on the hope that he could get a new eye in the near future.

Using his right hand to steady himself against the wall, he stepped from the room allowing the door to seal shut with a hiss behind him.

Phase one accomplished. It was time to begin phase two: see cool alien stuff, and phase 3, complete the actual mission. Ok yeah, he had added phase two in himself just a few seconds ago, but that was beside the point.

He squinted through his remaining eye like he was going to be able to see better and made his way up the hall.

There was something really disconcerting about missing a good twenty percent of his visual field, and it was very hard to avoid being frustrated or angry when he accidentally rammed his right foot into the edge of some sort of medical cart positioned in the hallway.

It didn’t hurt as it was he robotic leg that made contact, but he did let off a string of expletives as he nearly fell over almost plowing the –mostly intact—rest of his face into the cart as well. Eventually, he righted himself with only a few strange looks from passing aliens and continued to make his way up the hall.

To be honest – not discounting his eye—he was having the time of his life. This planet was teeming with cool aliens, and awesome alien technology: the use of which he couldn’t yet fathom. He couldn’t have come up with any of this in his wildest dreams; though as a kid he had definitely tried. Who would have thought he would truly make it here?

What was the wall even made out of, was it metal? No, it definitely felt too soft for metal, and the architecture was cool too, no sharp edges. It was all smooth and organic, just like he had expected from aliens.

And even more exciting were the aliens themselves, all of which he knew by heart. In fact, he knew way more than he let on, mostly because his extensive knowledge was actually a bit creepy. He had worked with Tesraki and Rundi before, while the rest of them were new --technically.

Vrul, Gibb, Tesraki, a Gromm: cool but also kind of gross; was the slime trail really all that sanitary?

Ah…ha, he had found what he was looking for. He reached the end of the hallway and pulled to a stop just short of what appeared to be a circulation desk waiting politely as the Vrul clerk, or nurse, busied itself with another doctor. However, his lurking didn’t go unnoticed, and the two turned to look at him shrinking back against the desk with wide eyes.

Doing his best to look less threatening, he made his way forward, only to be immediately surprised as the doctor tore off in the opposite direction and the clerk hid below the desk with a squeak. He was confused until he realized he was smiling.

Whoops.

He frowned, at least Dr. Krill hadn’t cut and run when he had first seen the “smile” though he had definitely thought about it.

“Er, sorry about that. I didn’t mean to scare you, but I do have a quick question. It will only take like five seconds of your time, no more than few minutes.”

No answer.

He sighed and leaned over the desk, “Promise I won’t hurt you if you help me.”

His threat worked, though he couldn’t have said he was particularly pleased. Eventually the little creature looked up at him. It was shaking like a leaf, and it could barely speak He pressed his lips tight together to avoid showing any teeth.

“Hello, my name is Captain Vir of the UNSC on loan to the GA, and I am looking for this man.” He had to wait longer than he would have liked for the little creature to actually turn its head and look, but by the time it did he had engaged the implant on his lower left arm and was projecting an image onto the nearest flat surface.

A human face stared out at them from the depths of the picture.

“Seen him?”

The little creature fumbled, “N-no humans here….”

“Clearly there are because I-“

“No humans here… just you. Now please. I have…work.”

The little Vrul scrambled about pathetically for a moment before giving up inflating its helium sack and making its escape over the desk and down the hallway.

He was left standing, nonplussed in the middle of the hallway by an empty circulation desk.

“Okaaayyy…” he flicked his wrist dismissing the projection before venturing down the hall showing the image to anyone who wasn’t too terrified to look.

Either everyone was too scared to recall, or they really hadn’t seen the human in the picture or any of the other humans (forty-one in total) that he could have shown them, and eventually he had run out of people to ask. With a defeated sigh, he followed his feet through the last door, surprised to find himself outside under a blanket of stars and the mind-blowing sight of a massive gas giant dominating the sky above delicate blues and greens awash over its marbled surface; the labor of love of some cosmic painter.

He paused, overcome with admiration.

Wow.

He lifted his hand, engaging the implant and snapping a picture of the sight before him. He looked down at his hand once more then, “What the hell.” He turned his back to the amazing sight and held his hand up: out and away from himself. With the other hand he gave a thumbs up as he snapped the image.

That was one for the album labeled “awesome pics of awesome places.”

Picture stored and camera shut off, he turned back to the view arms crossed.

The missing humans weren’t here and probably never had been. He hadn’t had high hopes but he had to begin somewhere and a single measly clue might have been nice. Every day they didn’t find anything was another day that the 41 missing military personnel could be dead, or worse. Then again, some of them had been missing for over two years, and the likelihood of them being alive was slim to none anyway. Space was a big place, and it had taken the 41st missing person to alert the UNSC that anything was wrong in the first place. Either way, UNSC personnel were going missing and no one could figure why.

With a deep sigh he tilted his head back gazing up at the sky in all her shadowy glory winking at him from the darkness like the flirtatious teasing of a distant lover. He let himself relax. She had always managed to calm him, even as a child when her velvety darkness seemed so remote and cold. And even now, when he could visit her often, he could still remember her first embrace, like it was yesterday.

***

Five Years Earlier

A low, early morning sun lorded over the North Carolina coastline, painting the surrounding sky with a bold wash of red, orange, and peach, untouched by the blemish of cloud cover. UN flags hung listlessly towards the ground as the sun cast her reaching fingers across the landscape.

Adam Vir could see them just beginning to reach through the wide panes of glass, stretching across the upper east wall of the flight hanger.

He tilted his head listening to the idling of the engines as six F-90 Darkfires were wheeled onto the runway just outside the hanger. The sound sent a thrill of excitement and nervous energy through his chest.

The sky outside was changing from a light peach to a bright blue, not a cloud in the sky.

The perfect day for flying.

He leaned over his little hand-held notebook and checked off another mark as he examined the breathing hoses in his suit. Around him, five others were doing the same.

"Captain Palmer, glad you could make it,"

The group of young pilots lifted their heads, alerted to a conversation across the room, which bounced and rolled off the corrugated steel roof.

"As am I. Tell me, what else is there to know about the program? Some of my superiors are more than a bit skeptical."

Adam Vir craned his neck trying to get a better look at the speakers.

"Of course, what exactly are your superiors' concerns?"

"Well, on paper they're just kids."

“I think you’ll find they are a little more than that, Captain.” Adam tilted his head a little further to the side recognizing the voice of their program’s commanding officer. Boots echoed across the floor, and he finally got a look at the approaching visitor: a man in his late thirties or perhaps early forties, with a stern, but not unkind, face and two captain’s bars pinned to his uniform.

Their commanding officer led him across the floor, stopping not a few feet away from their assembled group.

"Cadet Vir."

He stood quickly nearly tripping over the edge of his tarp as he did so blushing slightly at the look that passed between the two officers.

"At ease, cadet," the officer ordered, and he dropped his hand.

She stepped off to the side of the tarp, "Captain Palmer, this is Cadet Adam Vir: one of the first and youngest cadets to pass through the program. Cadet Vir, this is Captain Palmer; he has flown at least 10,000 flights in his career, the vast majority of them being trans-atmospheric and will be the observing instructor on your flight today."

Adam Felt another rush of nerves run through his body, "Captain Palmer, it'll be an honor to fly with you." He tried to keep his handshake firm, like his father had taught him.

Captain Palmer nodded to the notebook Adam held in his left hand, "What's this?"

"This, sir?" He raised the book, "preflight checklist. It helps me check things off." He instantly cringed inside.

It’s a checklist, helps me check things off… no shit genius.

A small smile tugged at the corner of the man’s mouth, “How old are you, son?”

“Nineteen, sir, twenty next week.” Wow, even he wanted to roll his eyes at himself.

“Nineteen, that’s pretty young. You finish high school?”

“Yes sir, the program covers that.”

Off to their side his superior officer nodded, “By the age of 18 these cadets have the education and training to more than equal a bachelor’s degree in aviation, flown over 1,000 hours of specialized flight training, and completed survival, astronomy and specialized in a STEM field.” She lifted her head in a gesture of pride Adam had never seen from her, “My cadets are the most well-trained aviators in the world, and many, if not all, are more than passable as foot soldiers."

Captain Palmer grunted skeptically, "That remains to be seen. I'll be stepping in for one of your instructors today. I want to personally see what your recruits can do."

"I'm more than confident they will be up to your superiors' standards."

Off to the side, Cadet Vir was only growing more nervous.

Captain Palmer nodded to him, “Don't let me get in your way."

He didn't get in the way, but watched closely from a distance as Cadet Vir examined his gear. Knowing he was being watched, he made sure to extra-scrutinize every last step. It was kind of reassuring as it didn’t really change much of his usual routine.

An hour later, they stepped from the hanger and out into a deluge of orange sunlight, the sun having risen over the distant horizon, painting the tarmac with molten fire. Together, they cut an impressive figure, rigged with the leading edge in military flight technology, which included but was not limited to polyester, neoprene, Gortex, Mylar, Normex, Dacron and Kevlar.

Cadet Vir adjusted his helmet nervously humming the theme song from "Top Gun" to himself as they walked.

Reaching the jet, two ground technicians were waiting to assist with pre-flight and take-off. Cadet Vir mostly ignored the captain turning his attention to an examination of the aircraft, jotting notes in his little notebook as he went, desperately juggling his helmet and almost dropping it on one occasion.

"Do you mind holding this for me, Captain?" He eventually asked, sheepishly proffering the helmet. The relief on the man’s face was obvious, glad that he wouldn't have to explain the destruction of an expensive and cutting edge piece of equipment.

Cadet Vir was thinking the same thing as he climbed the waiting ladder and released the canopy. He had done pre-flights like this hundreds of times now. He started a check of ejection systems, pulling pins and adjusting levers to his specifications. Another ladder had been brought around to the other side of the aircraft for the Captain, who slid into the rear seat with the practiced ease of a man who spent more time in the air than he did on the ground.

Adam slipped into the front seat, a tight fit but not too tight, and started with the set of buckles. The flight master stepped up the ladder to help him adjust the shoulder harnesses as he pulled the others into place with the satisfying click, click, click. He then adjusted the oxygen mask over his mouth and nose, fitting it snuggly into place and making sure the coil didn't get caught in his helmet. That done, both men pulled on their helmets, listening and waiting for the soft hiss, accompanied by a pop in the ears as the suit sealed into a completely pressurized system.

Adam listened as the flight master gave his little speech: going over any complaints or issues the jet had had during its last flight, though the list was short. Once done the man retreated down the ladder.

He adjusted a switch, waited for a light and then started the engine, allowing it to idle to twenty percent. Even inside his helmet, the power of the engine was practically deafening. He adjusted a few more dials, checked the engine lights and fuel flow before slowly accelerating the engine to fifty-five percent. The roaring only grew louder, rattling his bones and with it came a wave of excitement. He checked the controls, side mounted, instead of forward.

The sky outside was a pastel blue mutating towards eggshell as the sun continued to rise over them. Cadet Vir engaged the canopy, watching as it lowered slowly over his head and sides leaving him with almost 360 degrees of sight and a full console of controls. The burning light of the sun was somewhat dampened by the polarized barrier, but he still lowered the internal visor of his helmet. The landscape darkened around him, taking on a strange orange tint.

"Internal radio check?"

"Loud and clear," came Palmer's reply, voice somewhat metallic over the line.

He moved onto the altimeter and altitude indicators, before moving across a familiar pattern of flight instruments, all reading as expected. Signals were passed, and the two ground technicians removed the wheel chocks.

Vir toggled the radio switch for ACT, "Clearance, Delta 1 trans-atmo novice flight to Lunar 1."

He released the button, listening for instructions, "Delta 1 cleared, depart runway 3 right."

The engines rumbled below him as he made a few minor adjustments before continuing his conversation with air traffic control. The skies would be clear for him today, at least near the ground.

"Delta 1 ready for taxi."

"Delta 1 roger, taxi 03 left, hold short of Delta Sierra"

"Roger, hold short at Delta Sierra." A familiar pressure grew, seriously? He had peed three times before putting on the suit. This always happened. The ground began to move below him as he urged the jet into a slow taxi. The engines were somewhat more muffled than before, but still deafening; the sound was familiar, almost comforting. Inside his suit, his palms were beginning to sweat. His breath was coming heavier than normal, and he had to take a few deep breaths to calm himself. A steady stream of cool air passed over his face from the mask.

"Delta 1 taxi into position 03 right."

"Roger, into position"

"Delta 1 clear to takeoff runway 3 left..." He barely heard the rest of the communication over the pounding in his chest. He momentarily squeezed his eyes shut taking a few more deep breaths before pushing the thrust lever forward feeling the power of the machine as it began to accelerate, slow at first, and then faster and faster and faster until he was being pressed back into his seat. The roaring of the engines seemed to dampen to a rumbling static that was hardly comparable to the screaming roar those on the ground would be hearing.

The plane rattled and bounced around them as if threatening to tear herself apart, but he kept steady, waiting as the power of lift became more than the power of gravity, and then...lift off. He felt as the landing gear left the runway and the rattling evened out until they were hurtling smoothly into the deepening blue sky above.

He gritted his teeth tightening the muscles in his legs and chest, breathing in sharp bursts to combat the G-force. Through his seat and flight suit, he felt the soft thud as the plane's landing gear retracted into position.

His heart slowed and his breathing evened out. His hands grew steady about the controls as he accelerated them into a vertical push. He could feel the G-force, the ground pulling at his body as he continued his breathing exercises. Looking out the canopy he was vertical between both ground and sky. Ahead was only the darkening blue of a thinning atmosphere.

This was the most dangerous part of the journey, the transition into space. The atmosphere was holding them up now, but when there was none, the engines wouldn't be strong enough to make that last push into orbit. At Mach 2 they were not going nearly fast enough to reach escape velocity. Completely vertical now, he watched as their altitude gage climbed steadily and the horizon and sky began to blend together into a hazy white line as the curve of the earth became visible from inside the canopy. It grew in his vision expanding out towards infinity on his right and on his left like the unfurling wings of a massive mythical bird or celestial angel. Above him the clear eggshell blue of the sky's feathered underbelly deepened. The light of the sun condensed and whitened growing hotter and hotter and sharper and sharper.

Warning lights began blinking next to the altitude gage. He let them go for the next few seconds, steeling himself for the next and most dangerous step. As hyper aware as he was at that moment, it seemed as if he could feel the very particles of air expanding inside his lungs as he took a breath, held it and then......

He cut the engine.

For a few precious moments, they were carried upward by the vestiges of their momentum and then for an instant suspended in space and time, hung between earth and sky in a bubble of surreal silence, blue blackness above them, distant blue-tinted ground behind them.

With a practiced flick of a dial and compression, he felt the familiar ca-chunk as the jet engine seamlessly switched places with a smaller more powerful thrust engine. The Victor class 62 fusion engine, so much power in such a small package that it was against military regulations to allow its deployment in the lower atmosphere.

They had reached the apex of their momentum, and he could feel the gut churning pull of gravity as the jet began to slide backwards, quickly swallowed by the scattered blue light of the atmosphere.

With his right thumb, he toggled the gage for the fusion engine, and then with an intake of breath, pressed the hand-control forward. The response was like being fired from a gun. Inside the fusion engine, two hydrogen atoms collided, sending the jet they were in hurtling heavenward. The sound it produced was nothing short of awesome. The screaming of heaven and hell roaring at their heels, threatening to rip them apart with godly power if they didn't move fast enough.

His body rocked and rattled, his bones mimicking maracas as they shot skyward. He could barely see as his eyes rattled inside his skull. Mach 1, Mach 2, Mach 3. The numbers climbed faster and faster as the Earth receded behind them. They reached Mach 33, traveling faster than a bullet.

A thin ring of black threatened the corners of his vision and his legs grew numb as the suit's gear worked furiously to squeeze blood back into his head. As the darkness still threatened, he tensed the muscles in his stomach and chest, forcing the blood where he wanted it to go.

The curve of the Earth morphed from a flat horizon to a delicate parabola. The sky above blackened with each increasing second, and the sun brightened until, despite the protection of the canopy, the controls were lit up with a fiery white light, casting eerie shadows all around him. The sky above, no longer blue but a massive expanse of black touching the Earth's hazy, electric blue atmosphere that was, in that moment, the most beautiful color he had ever seen.

Everything grew silent.

The Earth rolled behind him into the blackness, its elegant curve growing tighter and tighter, the further they flew. Inside his chest, his heart hammered, his breath came in short, deep gasps. Behind him, the last, visible, vestiges of Earth's blue-tinted atmosphere was tossed away like a cloak leaving him with nothing but the blackness above and the ground, a distant marble of blue glass, behind.

He toggled a switch on the outside of his glove and his pre-flight navigation plan popped into his helmet. He was nearing LEO (low earth orbit) and would slow there to gain a proper trajectory to the moon and make contact with inter-space ATC. He followed the plans to the letter cutting into LEO and reducing the engine's output capacity to match required orbiting speed around 17,150 mph. He completely cut the afterburners and allowed Newton's laws to do the work for him, coasting at required orbital speed and only firing the engines when course correction was needed. Aside from the occasional rumble of the engines, traveling through the structure of the jet, all else was totally silent, and for the first moment, he allowed his mind to fully comprehend where he was and what he was doing. Earth hung below him like a painted Christmas ornament, the sky above was black, and the sun was approaching its zenith over Earth.

Out the right side of the canopy, there was only darkness, a vast abyss of space stretching out beyond comprehensive eternity. He blinked hard against the prickling at the corners of his vision. His face—no, his whole body-- erupted in pins and needles. He felt as if he were about to cry, or scream or...or laugh. He chose the latter. It started in his chest bubbling upwards through his throat and past his lips in gleeful exaltation. His heart was going to rupture.

He couldn’t stop the muffled whoop of triumph that broke from his lips driven by a celestial high granted to him by ... the universe? ... God? He didn't know.

Adam's face hurt, his chest ached, and his entire body trembled, but it was a good ache, from absolute and complete joy, better than any drug or lover. If he could just stay in this moment forever, live out eternity like this, suspended in this moment like a drop of water frozen on a pane of glass.

"Unknown aircraft, this is LEO Orbiter 9 requesting immediate verification, Acknowledge."

The moment tarnished as he opened the radio channel. "Roger Orbiter 9, this is Delta 1 trans-atmospheric novice flight from Fort Harmony requesting lunar route on grid Bravo One One, over." He had an immense amount of trouble keeping the grin out of his voice, glancing back at Earth's beautiful, marbled surface.

There was a moment of static before, "Delta 1 cleared, lunar route on grid Bravo one one. Alter course right 90 degrees lateral and 50 degrees vertical from your position, and continue course on the blue marker."

He acknowledged the call and fired the engine positioning the aircraft in a horizontal plane with the Earth as the sun dipped back behind Earth's horizon, darkening the space around him before his vision was filled with a thousand yellow glimmering lights, like stars or fireflies. It was with another incomprehensible rush of glee that he realized, those weren't stars, those were cities. Somewhere, someone down there was looking up at the sky, and unknowingly gazing at him!

The marker on his instruments blinked, and again, he adjusted the engines to bring the aircraft around in a slow curve away from Earth and further into the blackness of space. The moon glowed like a distant cosmic jelly-fish floating in the darkness.

"Delta 1 be advised, coarse adjustment two degrees vertical from your current for debris removal on course 2.1 degrees left and vertical of your position. Trans-space conditions have debris field warnings at a level 5, please proceed with caution."

"Roger, Orbiter 9 course corrections for acknowledge debris removal advisory."

He slowly adjusted, bringing the jet into a slow acceleration, avoiding the G-forces that would come with any abrupt acceleration. He would cut the engines when at speed to conserve energy. In the vastness of space, it seemed as if they were snailing across the expanse.

He keyed the mike on his suit, "Status, Captain Palmer?"

"Just fine cadet."

Everything around him had stilled, bringing with it the eerie silence of space. Past the distant, and occasional humming of the engines vibrating up through his suit, he could hear the throbbing of his own heart.

"May I ask a question?" He could hear his own voice over the speakers, and thought the experience to be rather unpleasant. Was his voice really that high?

"Shoot."

"Debris removal? I didn't think they did that out this far."

Their speed was slowly increasing. Earth was falling away behind them at a rate their ancestors had only been able to imagine.

"Over two thousand years of space travel, millions of satellites, rocket pieces, debris from accidents, establishing a base on the moon, and the colonization of Mars. There has been a ton going on up here for quite a while. A lot of people think since space is so vast, it's not a big deal to leave things floating up here. Problem is, trying to tap and track it all so we don't accidentally run into it. With exponential addition of debris comes exponential likelihood of collisions."

"I see. How bad is a level 5 advisory? I mean, I know theoretically, but..."

"Level five is pretty serious, expect to see heavy clusters, and expect multiple course corrections. Point is, keep an eye on the short range radar, no.... just keep an eye on everything."

"How far are they into the cleanup?"

Captain Palmer snorted, which came as a burst of static over the line. "Not even close. The UN only advised the cleanup fifty maybe sixty years ago, and they've been struggling with funding. A lot of the barges haven't been serviced since they were put into service, and most are barely maintained to proper specifications."

"I’ve read all the intel, but what dangers I should most expect?" At speed, he had cut the engine and allowed them to coast through space on his pre-planned trajectory.

"This is space kid, nothing more dangerous, but if you want a short list: space debris, solar flares, coms outages etc."

Vir spent the next hour squeezing the more experienced man for information between periods of course correction. He wasn't kidding about the debris problem. This place was an equipment graveyard and all around him hung the bones of unnecessary or outdated technology.

He kept an eye on his instruments as the captain had suggested, not that he would have ignored them otherwise. In between occasions of instrument examination, he couldn't help but slip into his initial ecstasy. This felt like a dream.

He was in space. The only place he had always wanted to go, and the one place that always seemed so far away, physically and metaphorically.

A light blinked on his dash, and he looked down to find the small green light blinking on his radar indicator.

Following the prompting from his equipment, Cadet Vir switched comms frequency and sent out a hale, "Acknowledge, unknown aircraft, be advised this is Delta 1 closing in on your airspace."

He waited, and waited, and waited.

"Acknowledge, unknown aircraft"

Still no answer as the craft was growing closer. From the trajectory maps, he noted a slight deviation of the aircraft from its planned course, not to mention the densely packed debris field which took up a surprisingly large chuck of space directly in across their trajectory.

He opened the com prepared to repeat his hail when.

"Delta 1 this is Skywake, go."

He took a deep breath in relief. He could see the barge no: it was an old model, a dragger by nickname, using a programmed magnetic field on a drag chain to collect junk and send it in the proper direction, but at this current moment it simply idled in space with its drag chain suspended uselessly behind and slightly to its left.

"Skywake this is Delta 1, advising course correction 1-degree horizontal right, or advise ATC course correction."

"Negative, Delta 1, course correction impossible experiencing technical difficulties. ATC has been notified."

Reaching the edge of the debris field, Vir used both sight and radar to plot the best course through the field firing the engines after rotating the rear thruster forward to slow his progression and then taking a wide detour to the side. As far as space went, there was a lot of room between him and the junk, but large spaces meant nothing at high speeds.

"What the hell are these guys doing?" Captain Palmer cursed from the back.

Whatever technical difficulties the barge was having had now caused it to drift heavily to its left leaving the craft positioned dangerously close to the nearest cluster of junk. Adam had studied flying for six years now, non-stop from morning until night, and he knew proper procedure on piloting a drag barge even though he had never performed a flight.

He knew what too close looked like.

Adam opened the com again intending to warn the pilots of their course drift in case their interior emergency had distracted them from their piloting duties.

It was then he noticed a light blinking in the darkness. The light at the end of the magnetic drag chain popped on for a moment. As it did, a chunk of wreckage popped off the outer skeleton of the nearest wreck like the sloughing of skin. It twirled idly through space gaining momentum towards the drag chain where it was likely to stop and stick, but as it grew closer, the light at the end of the chain shut off, and the bit of wreckage bypassed the chain.

"Shit!" Adam scrambled for the coms, "Skywake Coll-"

He wasn't able to finish his sentence as the piece of junk went tearing past the drag chain, severing a side bumper before plowing into the back of the ship near the engine bank. Something ruptured, blasting through the outer hull, finding fuel by way of the oxygen within. The explosion was silent but violent as fire consumed all the available oxygen in the interior, melting metal and rocketing shrapnel into the surrounding space. The fire died almost instantly, but shrapnel hurtled recklessly through space, not slowing down and not stopping. The explosion itself had been enough to blast the closest wreckage sideways, which was now being pelted with discharged shrapnel from the charred remains of the barge.

For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

As space junk crashed into space junk, a chain reaction was initiated, and the field about them quickly turned into the grinding blades of a blender as shrapnel flew at explosion speeds, nearly 3,000 mph, in all directions transferring its energy into anything it touched. They could have easily outrun the explosion, if it weren't for the minefield of debris ahead of them.

The small sub wing engines fired to their back and sides. The rear engine engaged, and the jet cut a tight spiral downwards and then up, sheering past a gargantuan sheet of metal which had blasted from the original wreckage. They were so close to imminent death that it cast a shadow over them as they rolled upright.

In the pilot's seat, Adam had gone very still. Outside hellfire rained down around them, yet Vir was a rock against the impending onslaught. He thought about nothing, he felt nothing, but he saw everything. The skeleton of some long decommissioned shuttle sliced past them as he rolled in a counterclockwise circle spinning over and around the speeding shrapnel.

There was a moment, a lone slice of time when Adam found himself looking up, technically down, at the object, watching as light from the distant sun cut razor edges along its sheer metal ribs. He could have reached out and touched it. His body was launched right as the jet continued its tight roll, immediately diving downwards as a metal beam careened past and into the darkness. He thrust forward and his body was thrown back against his seat, limbs screaming in protest as they rolled into an immediate vertical climb. He groaned against the force, feeling the apparatus around his legs constrict.

Adam’s hearing was completely gone, space around him had slowed. He yawed left, barely avoiding losing one of his wings to an unrecognizable ball of melted metal.

Rolling over the top of the second skeleton, Adam plunged down on the other side, forcing his body to take as many Gs as it could handle The contraption around his leg squeezed until his thighs went numb. The muscles in his chest and abs were as taught as steel cables.

He cut left and then right, rocking upwards and then sinking down below the next obstacle like he was riding the trough of a wave. A short acceleration and tight turn to the right pulled them away from another collision followed by a short vertical dive which rolled them up between two jagged teeth of metal finally bringing them slicing into the first open space they had seen since the disaster began.

For a moment it seemed as though they were safe, but a sudden jolt sideways, throwing the right wing up and the left wing down towards vertical brought them perpendicular to one piece of trash Adam had not initially seen. Time jolted to a stop for him as he lifted his head and looked through the top of the canopy...coming face to face with a partially charred corpse, every excruciating detail of scarlet and white blistered skin seared into his brain. Light from the white hot sun behind them cast the charred skin into sharp relief highlighting its raw edges in razor intense light and casting the rest into deep black shadow. White bone glittered from a hole torn in the throat, and a single eyeless socket peered at him from the blackness.

Then it was gone.

He pulled the jet vertical just in time to roll right.

At one point, he flipped the engine, forcing them to slow so fast that he nearly blacked out despite all their technology and safeguards. He feared the worst when his vision cleared, but somehow, he had managed to roll the jet in a tight backwards loop and under the refuse before them.

Ahead of them, the moon glowed white in the sharp, unforgiving light of the sun.

"Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! Lunar 1; this is Delta 1 F-90 Darkfire, in immediate danger of debris collision requesting ground to air support, position 75 degrees vertical, right 20 degrees heading course correction to grid bravo one one with two persons on board, do you copy?"

"Delta 1, this is Lunar 1 authorizing immediate ground to air assistance."

Another roll to the right, as a chunk of metal ripped past.

They could see the lunar station now, a strange atmospheric bubble kept in place by a grid of gravity generators and life support systems as wide as a sizable city, on the bright side of the moon. Somewhere just outside the atmospheric field, an anti-air gun locked onto a target and triggered release. A piece of debris was vaporized instantly.

After that came a volley of similar explosions reducing the space debris to ash, creating ethereal powder clouds. The AA guns were not effective at distances much outside their current position.

Adam adjusted the plane’s position catching the moon's orbit. They were close enough now that he could see the craters and pockmarks on her surface. The closer they got, the more detailed the surface became until they were in a LLO, low lunar orbit, not much further than 70 miles from ship to surface. Distantly the flashes of the rail guns were bursting forth in the darkness, but they were out of the field of danger.

"Lunar 1, this is Delta 1, requesting permission to land runway 2 left."

They waited for a moment, cutting over the lunar horizon slowly angling down into landing position.

"Delta 1 you are cleared to land runway 2 left, proceed at current heading and reduce speed."

He did as he was directed, descending closer and closer and closer to the lunar surface. The moment they connected with the atmospheric bubble was more violent than anticipated. Sudden friction due to air pressure slowed them with a jolt and the sudden entrance into the gravity field dragged them downwards, but he forced the jet into submission, and guided her gently towards the ground, reducing speed throughout. All around his instruments were malfunctioning in confusion based on the man-made magnetic field which companioned the analogue atmosphere.

Their landing left...something to be desired. It could have been prettier but being jarred a couple of times was better than being dead. Sound had returned with the presence of air and the roaring of the wind against the flaps was deafening as they came to a slow stop.

"Delta 1, you are clear to taxi."

The jet didn't have to idle far before they were given the command to stop. Their wheels were immobilized, and ladders were brought to each side of the canopy, which released with a loud hiss.

With stiff limbs Captain Palmer was first out of the cockpit maneuvering himself onto the ladder and turning probably expecting to see the cadet already unbuckled, but Adam was still sitting in position inside the cockpit.

Adam’s chest heaved as he gasped desperately for air. Hands, once steady on the controls, began to shake: tiny oscillations at first, then morphing into bone rattling tremors that probably would have registered on the Richter Scale. With stiff hands Adam struggled with his helmet, but his fingers refused to cooperate, growing more desperate every moment.

Captain Palmer grabbed him by the shoulder to steady the horrendous shaking and released the helmet, pushing it into the arms of one of the waiting technicians. With a clawed hand, Adam managed to rip the oxygen mask from his face with clumsy fingers and gasp at the air like a dying fish, quick and shallow forever grateful some scientist had managed to rig up an atmosphere on the moon.

Captain Palmer gripped the back of his head and forced Adam to look at him "Hey, hey! Look at me! Look - at - me!" Adam could barely breathe as adrenaline tore through him, but he locked eyes with Captian Palmer, green to brown.

"That was some DAMN good flying, damn good, now take some deep breaths…there you go...relax." Adam complied, but shakily. "We made it. You got both of us out alive, now come on let's go get out of these suits, maybe get something to eat."

"C-captain p-p-Palmer.....I c-can’t feel... m-my legs." Though his entire body was also numb.

Captain Palmer looked up at him and sighed, "Delayed response." Palmer ordered one of the technicians into place on the other side and then had another ladder brought over. Together the two men managed to help Vir from the cockpit and down the ladder where his knees gave out. Captain Palmer caught him around the middle and walked him to a sitting position on the ground. He knelt next to him as a team of paramedics rushed from the bay doors.

"He's fine, just a little post-panic is all. Can you feel your legs yet?"

Inside his boot, Adam flexed his toes, "I...think so."

"Good," he felt Captain Palmer pat him reassuringly on the back as the paramedics looked him over. "Like I said kid, that was some impressive flying, and you kept it together until we landed. See this," he held up a hand, "I'm shaking too."

His breathing was feeling a little better, "Captain Palmer, can I ask a favor?"

"Anything you want kid,"

"Can I call my parents?"

Captain Palmer barked a laugh which filled the analogue atmosphere on Lunar 1, "Cadet, if you asked to call the president of the UN, I'd find her number and hand you the phone."

He gave a shaky and nervous smile, breathing unevenly past the last of the panic.

Overhead, the sky was filled with millions of stars, and below him…. Below him the moon was a hard pressure against his hands, reassuring under, the not-so-distant black sky.

***

Now where the hell was his room? He had definitely planned on getting back before anyone noticed his absence, but the medical center was larger than he expected, and aliens didn’t seem to have a habit of labeling walls with room or floor numbers. He thought he was on the same hall as his room, but somehow he had managed to get himself turned around. He wasn’t actually sure how he managed to get lost, but he was just going to go with it.

So he just walked down the halls nodding and giving a friendly greeting to most of the aliens he passed, trying to avoid smiling but finding it extremely difficult to override his social programming.

Hmm, did this look familiar?

He was just turning around another corner when he caught the sound of a distant voice coming at him from down the hallway. He recognized that voice, and backpedaled hefuriously upon seeing the little Vrul surgeon making his way down the hall.

Dr. Krill hadn’t seen him yet, but any moment he might look up and catch him standing there walking around directly against doctorly orders. He didn’t know what it was about the little creature that caused him to make a very scrambling and undignified exit into the nearest hospital room, but he had a feeling that he was going to experience a very unpleasant chewing out. Back against the wall in the new room he listened, head cocked, as the doctor passed on the outside.

“The very gal of him. Clearly I have responsibilities, things I have to do here for my own planet, and my own society. I can’t just go prancing off across the-“

Krill’s voice faded into the distance, and he was about to leave when the room’s occupant caught his eyes. He paused, his sole eye widening as he approached the bed and the pitiful figure that huddled there.

For all Krill said about human survival, he was honestly surprised this Tesraki was alive. The creature, usually covered from head to toe in a coating of thick fur, was a mangy, patchy mess. The exposed skin was enflamed and covered in bandages. The emaciated body ended with a tail at least three times thinner than it should have been. He couldn’t help his horrified fascination as he stepped closer.

The Tesraki must have heard his approach because as he moved closer it opened its eyes. Somehow he could tell it wasn’t entirely there. It turned its head to face him blinking slowly.

“Human,” it muttered.

It didn’t seem surprised.

He paused at its bedside staring down at its horrible wounds with an expression of sympathy. He wasn’t entirely sure what he was doing, but unable to contain the overwhelming need to do something, he reached and gently took the hand of the creature in his, “Do you…need me to find a doctor or something?”

The creature didn’t respond but the fingers of its hand curled a little around his, which he saw as a good sign.

“Human,” It muttered again.

“I…” he paused, confused and intrigued. “Have you met humans before?”

The Tesraki’s head lolled, “Everything is on fire,” it muttered.

“I should probably get a doctor.” He went to step away, but the creature held him tighter. “No, the planet is on fire. The sun lights it on fire.” Its eyes were wild and the breathing was frantic.

“Ur, no, no, you’re ok. The planet doesn’t light on fire.”

“Orange everywhere.”

“Shhh, you’ll be ok, let me just call a nurse or something.”

But the more he tried to pull away, the harder the hand gripped around his. The creature’s eyes locked onto his with a sudden strange lucidity, “You can see it in their eyes!”

“Okay, okay! You should rest, and I should get you a doctor.” The Tesraki continued to protest, but Captain Vir managed to pry his hand away turning towards the door and …. immediately freezing.

Dr. Krill stood in the doorway, and man did he look pissed. Now, Captain Vir didn’t know a whole lot about Vrul facial expressions, but he would recognize a body posture like that anywhere.

“Shit….” he rubbed the back of his head, “You know you are pretty stealthy, like a ninja.”

“What-are-you-doing-here?” Dr. Krill demanded.

“Er-“

“I gave you strict instructions to stay in bed while your injury healed! And I am failing to determine what part of do not move isn’t translating.”

“The not moving part, I guess.” He trailed off as two medical assistants stepped into the room behind the doctor.

“Return him to his room.”

“Don’t you think that is a bit excessive? I feel f-“

That was when the gravity field enveloped him, lifting him off the ground and immobilizing his body.

The technology here was seriously cool as hell, but it was also a serious inconvenience.

Ahead of him the doctor stormed out of the room muttering to himself, “Idiotic, reckless, moronic, lack of self-preservation.”

This time it was Adam’s turn to float after, and as he did he couldn’t help the small smile that crept across his face. Of course, he knew it was a long shot, but still maybe if he planted a seed.

“You know doc, if you did happen to join my crew, you could probably help me deal with that particular character flaw.”

Up ahead the doctor stalwartly ignored him.

He shrugged.

Oh well, not like it was going to work anyway.


	6. Chapter 6

The human nose is capable of distinguishing 1 trillion separate odors based on the arrangement of an estimated 400 types of scent receptors. Only a handful of species, including the Drev, are known to have this sense, though only humans demonstrate it's use to such a high degree.

“Stop it! Don’t let it get away!”

Feet rattled on stone behind Chalan as three docking guards held hard pursuit. She could hear them yelling orders to each other as she ran, her feet impacting the hard stone, sending shocks up into her joints of her knees.

She skidded around a corner, the voices falling behind her.

Good, she had lost them.

At least, that’s what she thought until the Rundi pulled up beside her. Its long two-toed feet beating against the ground as it ran, its long neck holding up a surprisingly small bug-like head.

“Stop immediately, you are in violation of docking code four five-”

Chalan ignored it and cut sideways shouldering the Rundi violently in the side and sending it careening into a nearby pile of crates. There was a cry of pain and an explosion of shards and splinters as the creature came to a violent halt. She had forgotten how fast those strange creatures could run, though she wasn’t going to have to worry about it for the foreseeable future.

It did not get back up.

She skidded around another corner barely having time to examine her surroundings as she tried to weave an impossible path for her pursuers to follow.

By the time she stopped, it had been a while since she had heard the last voice yelling for her capture. She slowed to a stop, and that finally gave her time to get a good look at her surroundings.

Things that hadn’t clicked before began to click now. First of all, it was unbearably hot: Chalan knew hot, the hot of a harsh volcanic wind as it rushes up from rivers of lava but this, this was a bit different. The heat never seemed to end, it didn’t come in waves, but laid over her like the weight of an oppressive corpse.

She didn’t like it.

Next came the sky, and lifting her head Chalan was surprised to find that the light above her, rather than being blue was an almost yellowish green, tinted and sickly like a festering wound.

Looking down at the ground, she watched as the wind blew ripples into small hillocks of bright blue sand which piled against the sides of buildings: domelike and constructed of white marble. The only plants she could see peered over the domes; yellow in color and peculiar in the way they stuck up into the air like fingers.

Chalan turned in a circle.

What kind of planet was this: the sky being green and the ground being blue?

In the distance, she could see great hillocks of blue sand piled up into mounds as large as hills stretching off into the expanse.

She continued to spin in a circle overwhelmed suddenly by the alien nature of it all. It hadn’t occurred to her till now, not fully sunk in that she was not on Anin anymore. She was alone, in an expansive galaxy, on an alien planet of which she knew nothing.

There was no one to help her and nowhere to go.

A hungry growling arose deep inside her, and she steadied herself against the side of one of the dome structures, while another hand rested on her stomach.

She needed something to eat.

But would she even be able to ingest anything on this planet?

Would she die of starvation before her mission even began?

Why had she not considered these things before?

Chalan took a deep breath and shook her head; no, she would not die here, of that she was sure. She just needed to find something that the natives eat, and then, possibly, there would be something for her as well.

She adjusted her cloak and bag over her shoulder before concealing her spear low against her side. Blue sand ground beneath her toes as she made her way across the hot sand blinded by the reflection coming from the buildings. In the distance, she could hear the churning of voices.

She turned, following the sound up the next passage receiving plenty of strange and nervous looks as she reached the main thoroughfare.

They had likely never seen a Dzhal before, or a Drev as they were more commonly called by aliens.

Figures shrunk into the shadows as she passed eyes wide with concern, fear and curiosity at her height, and her sheer strangeness. She thought them strange as well, with their lack of secondary rms and long, knobby legs.

The voices swelled up around her, as she found herself standing out in an open dusty square coated for one side to the other in that blue dust. On either side of her, rows upon rows of strange shelters shaded their occupants from the rays of the overhead sun. She lifted one hand to shade her eyes obliviously standing in the center aisle as bodies pushed around her.

A few passerbys looked up to scold her for standing in the way, but upon seeing her they quickly hurried about their business, unwilling to see what her response would be. Her translator popped on with the next wave of shouts.

“Sand fruit! Get your sand fruit. Just in season! Get your sand fruit here.”

“Power cells, conversion plugs, only 100 credits each.”

“You there, you look like you might be interested in what I am selling.”

Countless voices washed up pooling together in an amalgamation of united clamor such that she had difficulty making out one voice from another. Glancing from one alien to the next her head spun with voices. She had never been anywhere so crowded in her life.

She threw her upper hands over her ears desperately trying to block it all out as she moved through the stalls. Calls for fruit were still going out, as she pushed her way through the crowd not knowing where to go or what to do.

Fruit… food.

She pulled to a stop by one of the stalls eyes looking down at the strange pink lumps that were laid out over the table.

“Get your fruit.”

She reached out a hand.

“Hey, payment first!”

She lifted her head lowering her hands from her ears.

“Payment?”

“Yeah, payment, money, credits,” the Tesraki rubbed two of his three fingers together.

She blinked dumbly at him, “What is…payment, money?”

He stared at her astonishment. He seemed almost offended by her words and stood for a moment, mouth agape in shock, “What do you mean what is money? Money is the sweet glorious substance by which the economy is run, by which we purchase goods and get rich enough to buy more expensive goods.”

She looked down at her hands, “I do not have any of this…money.”

Her stomach growled.

The Tesraki stared at her incredulously. Off to the side, Chalan noticed one of the shopper’s arm was scanned, and with a beep, they were allowed off with their purchase.

How was she to get this money?

The Tesraki sighed, “Tell you what. You look big and strong…and I bet you can fight.”

“Of course I can.”

“Then let’s make a trade. I will hire you as protection for my caravan. Protect me and my goods as we travel to the next market and you can have all the fruit that you want. Sound fair?”

She paused, looking the furry little creature over. What did she have to lose? “Deal.”

“Excellent,” he rolled her a fruit and she caught it in her two lower hands, “Meet me at that edge of the city when the sun goes down.”

She nodded clutching the warm pink lump in her hands.

He waved her off, “Now scram, you are obstructing the view of my merchandise.”

She scrambling into the shade of the nearby buildings to hide out the day while avoiding dock guards and satisfying her emptiness.

***

21 years previous

The sky above Anin was overcast with accumulated ash. It was the dark season, and sickly clouds clotted out the sun leaving the usually colorful landscape drab and muted.

The dwellings of Analos, sat under an umbrella of ash, lording over the land of darkness. Distantly, the ash was lit by a bolt of subdued blue lightning and accompanying muffled and indistinct thunder. The eerie blueness of the flash cast its pallor over the central cathedral with its dark spires which clawed towards the sky as if in an attempt to pierce the cloud cover.

The village itself was silent, but behind stone doors within the heart of the citadel life teamed, and voices echoed toward the vaulted ceiling; quiet hissings, gurglings, clicking and murmurings rose and fell.

An aberrant blue light emanated from cracks in the stone adding a bit of luminance to the austere darkness, while firelight radiated from coal sconces placed about the edges of the room.

Carved into the stone a few feet from the two polar sides of the fire basin, glowed two twin circles.

Despite its central position and an overabundance of space, the central floor was almost completely devoid of figures. Most of the watching eyes, ranging from orange to gold, peered silently from the top of the stairs with overzealous curiosity, while the figures themselves bent backwards into the shadows hoping to remain unnoticed.

As it was, there were only five figures occupying the center floor, standing just at the base of the stairs toeing the border of the leftmost circle. Two of the figures were clad from head to foot in glorious plated armor, which from its massive weight, bent the backs on which it sat. Massive horns curved from the tops of their helmets, and sharp spikes jutted from their shoulders matching the brutal spikes and jutting curves of their war staves; one gold and one a nebulous purple.

They waited in silence as the minutes passed on.

From somewhere in the darkness, the soft pad of footsteps could be heard, but no one acknowledge the figures as they stepped onto the floor at the opposite end of the room. Some shuffled from age, while others walked with a solemn confidence, their eyes staring vacantly forward. They stopped at the edge of the opposite polar circle.

Around the room, silence reigned, but for the crackling babble of the fires. It continued for a short eternity until the hush was shattered by the clatter of steel on stone. Heads lifted, and with the clattering of armor, the onlookers quietly turned towards one of the shadowy hallways. From its depths, a form materialized from the darkness.

She was an imperious figure of consummate grace and power, her pearlescent armor clearly demonstrating her exalted ranking. Tongues of golden firelight flicked shards of radiance off the opalescent armor before fracturing into a million rays of color which spilled down her body forcing the closest observers to look away.

All creatures could behold this glorious image, but those with the addition of ultraviolet perception were forced to look away from the resplendent figure as she glided across the stone. Even without the armor, she was a celestial figure glowing with an array of prismatic color which scattered, warped, and churned about her body. If her color, radiance and power did not proclaim her status than her height surely did.

While the most imposing Drev reached nine to ten feet tall, she towered at an imposing height of ten feet eleven inches. She was, in fact, the most beautiful creature to grace Anin's surface in over a thousand years, blessed by the spirits with beauty and fighting prowess.

Rizna, Sentinel of the Citadel, paused at the center of the leftmost circle surrounded as she was by a loose semi-circle of council members; including the Magnate, his two acolytes, and the two high generals.

"May your steel be sharp, and may the fire light your path in the dark."

Voices murmured the ancient greeting back to her with heads lowered in deference to her ringing voice of power.

The Sentinel planted her war staff against the cold black glass silently giving permission for the Magnate to take charge of the meeting. He did so with a straight back.

"Warriors of Analos, we gather together today in reverence of and to pay homage to the spirits above and below." Despite his age, the Magnate's voice echoed powerfully about the chamber enveloping the room with his presence, "Today, on the eve of the seventeenth moon, we offer a choice." The room turned as the Magnate did, watching him as he strode powerfully across the intervening space between the circles, passing the bowl of fire and standing before the group of elder Drev bent by their age and devoid of armor.

"Today you will be given a choice to prove your worth for this clan, or to offer yourself as a sacrifice to the spirits." Behind him, the acolytes burst into motion. One held a bowl in his hands, while the other prodded the roaring fire with a set of metal tongs. As the room watched they retrieved several blazing embers from the fire and placed them into the bowl. One held the bowl while the other retrieved a crude metal spear, which had been leaning severely against the fire bowl. Both returned to stand behind their master, heads lowered, faces and eyes obscured by cowls of coarse, dark cloth.

Gesturing to the acolytes, the Magnate stepped to the side. "Choose your fate; embers from the celestial fires and an immediate embrace with of the gods or," he motioned to the spear, "take up your weapons and fight on the front lines. Die so that others might live, or live and prove your place in the citadel as an acolyte." He raised his hands towards the ceiling, "but remember this: if you choose the fire, but shirk your sacrifice you will be an outcast; a blight, a disease upon us, and you will never be allowed on clan soil. Even our enemies will shirk your presence knowing what you have done."

The room shivered with the exclamation.

"Choose wisely," the Magnate muttered, motioning with a large sweeping gesture of his hands towards the two acolytes and their proffered offerings.

The room grew quiet as the Magnate stepped to the side leaving the path clear for the elder Drev to step forward and make their choice. And they did so in silence; most had already made their decision walking slowly forward without hesitation as they took up the spear and bowed to the acolyte who held it on the opposing polar side. The vast majority of the elders chose the spear, gripping the stiff steel rod with a hard, cold conviction born from a lifetime of continual warfare.

But there was one. She was old, debilitated and shrunken from years of battle, twisted by age and washed of all color. Her gait was halting and stiff as she moved up the stone, the natural movement clearly causing her great pain. She paused before the two acolytes, head down in deep contemplation.

The room was silent.

The moment hung like frozen time before she raised her wizened head, reached out a hand, and plucked a fiery ember from the bowl on the left. As the fire's heat made contact with her skin, it sizzled and hissed sending acrid smoke up into the darkness of the vaulted ceiling. Her face remained still and emotionless without a hint of searing pain.

The room was filled with a hissing; a muttering of surprise and reverence.

The Sentinel, quiet until now, stepped forward in all her dazzling glory. The wizened warrior lowered her head in deference, yet her bearing was proud and resolute.

"Look up devoted one. Lift your eyes, for the spirits will soon accept your sacrifice for our people. During the light of our next moon, venture to the fire of your choice."

"Yes, my sentinel," she whispered, and was whisked away into the dark to be prepared and purified for her sacrifice.

The Magnate raised a hand to silence the whisperings in the room, "Delay for the time being, for we have a pressing matter to discuss." The room settled back into place as the warriors shifted in place.

The Magnate turned, supporting himself on the weight of his staff.

“General Lanus, General Kazna, your child has survived past the lunar marker and may now be presented before the war council for acceptance into the clan."

The room broke into a cacophony of muttered whispers.

General Lanus stepped forward into the light, where the entire room was finally able to see the small bundle cradled gently in his lower arms, but even as he stood, he did not remove its covering.

Together the Sentinel and the Magnate waited impatiently, "Go on general, present her to the clan so that the kit may be judged worthy of our ranks."

General Lanus didn't move, but instead opened his mouth to speak, "My fellow warriors... I will indeed present our offspring to the clan, but before I do... I beseech the council to grant me a courtesy..."

The room was again filled with curious whispers. The Magnate lifted his chin in surprise, intimating at an underlying challenge.

General Kazna shot her battle partner a look, "Lanus -" she hissed.

He stared her down, "You chose this pyre Kazna, and we shall both burn on it." Ignoring her, he turned back to the council who looked on in surprise, "Forgive me, your glory, but I must ask that you give us a chance to explain ourselves before judgment."

Around the room eyes were beginning to narrow.

"What is the meaning of this, General?" the Magnate hissed.

"Show us the kit," the Sentinel demanded.

General Lanus raised his distressed yet regal head and complied by lifting the kit in his arms and pulling away the bundle that had covered her. It fell to the ground with an ill-omened flourish.

A gasp of shock and repulsion rose up around the room as Lanus raised the child into the light proffering the tiny, groggy form before the light of the fire. Over the last month her delicate plate armor had fused and darkened to a beautiful lightning blue.

While exquisite, she was...so...diminutive.

"What is the meaning of this Kazna?" hissed the Magnate. "This is intolerable, that abomination should have been cast into the fire upon birth."

General Lanus drew the tiny creature to his chest protectively, "She survived the lunar marker, and despite her size, she is strong ... and beautiful."

"She is a runt!"

General Kasna stepped back as if she had been slapped. Lanus’s anger grumbled deep in his chest. The kit squirmed in Lanus's large, outstretched hand, small enough that he could hold her with a single palm. The tiny mouth opened like a baby bird wide and pink as she yawned sleepily. Golden eyes blearily blinked open as her legs and arms began to flail. The tiny creature squirmed and wriggled, but the cry she let off was powerful, echoing to the very spires and disappearing into darkness.

"You hear that," Lanus urged, "she is strong, she is worthy. Give her a chance. I know she can prove herself." A muttering mushroomed around them. Words of disapproval and dismay slithered through the air like a parasitic infection wiggling its way into the minds of those unsure.

Lanus stood against the tide of hostility, battered but steadfast as he continued to hold the tiny squirming kit to the light. General Kazna remained still her head bowed, detached and seemingly disinterested in the fate of her own young.

"General Kazna, you have defied tradition and violated our rules," the Magnate spat, and for the first time in so many minutes, Kazna finally raised her head.

Two gold eyes blinked coldly from the darkness of her visor. "I failed my duty," she responded stiffly.

"No! Kazna!" Lanus spun towards the Magnate in frustration. "She doesn't know what she's saying, your glory. I have watched the moon rise and fall a thousand times since Kanan was born, and since him we have lost son after son, daughter after daughter, and now this one lives, and after all we have done for the clan you would reject our desire to keep what we managed to conceive. Have you no respect for who we are and what we have done?"

His diatribe was cut off by a thundering crack of steel against stone, "We are not responsible for your genetic dysfunction, Lanus. You two may be strong, and your first son is promising, but since then your bloodline has proven to be weak. Your honor, your sacrifice, your conquest means nothing here." The Magnate said

"Then why should we not cast you into the fire for your ailment?" Lanus hissed.

The Magnate grew very still, "What?" His voice was quiet and sharp like the scratch of a blade against porous stone.

Lanus straightened, "I said, why do we not cast you into the fire for your disfigurement?" When no one dared speak, he continued, "My daughter may not be an adequate size, but the spirits have gifted her with the color of blue fire and lightning and surprising power."

No one spoke for the longest moment, until the Sentinel stepped forward into the light, again dazzling the room with her magnificence. Slowly she crossed the circle and stopped before Lanus. He stepped back protectively, but she raised a consoling hand, tilting her head to look down at the kit nestled happily against her father's warm skin.

She ran a digit delicately over the kit's cheek. The little face turned towards her palm, and four grasping hands reached upwards clasping tight about the Sentinel's fingers. Slowly, she raised her hand, and the kit came with, clinging desperately to Rizna's hand with the power of its four tiny limbs.

Reluctantly Lanus let her go as the Sentinel took the kit into her arms looking down at the tiny face with the same loving nature that her very own mother should have looked on her, "She is quite beautiful ...."

Lanus lifted his head, a glimmer of hope radiated from his eyes.

"It is a pity she is thus disfigured. Guards restrain him!"

"NO!" Lanus lunged forward, but their response was too quick for him to rescue his daughter. Heavily-armored guards sprung forward, grabbing him by his arms. He fought wildly for the first few seconds, but a sudden spear butt to the back of his knee sent him painfully to the ground.

"KAZNA!" His call was desperate and pleading, but she made no move to aid him, stiffening instead against his pleading cries.

A spear to his throat, one to his back, surrounded by no less than five guards ... for they would need that many to subdue the general and a protective father.

The Sentinel ignored his cries walking across the open circle towards the flickering ribbons of the central fire. Sensing something wrong, the kit began to squirm and issue powerful chirps of fear and confusion.

Lanus fought harder, but a spear point dug even deeper into the soft part of his throat choking his cries.

With a swift flick of her wrist the Sentinel upended the kit dangling it by one foot over the roaring flames. The powerful cries of fear had now turned into screams of pain as fire and heat licked at its delicate skin.

"KAZNA, HELP HER!" The cry was powerful, rattling through the stone and causing the ground to quake with its anguish. Eyes turned imploringly to his mate, but Kazna refused to look at him hunching inwards against herself.

A bellow of anguish wrenched from Lanus’s throat, long and tormented, "Chalan, no...."

The Sentinel stopped, the kit continued to ferociously wriggle and scream over the open flame.

"What did you say?" she probed.

Lanus sagged towards the floor. "Chalan, her name is Chalan," his voice was a desperate whisper, yet the agony in his simple phrase echoed in the rafters where it grew stale and cold.

The room was alive with whispers.

"You named this abomination?" The sentinel demanded. "She wasn't to be named until the first lunar marker. You know that."

He stared defiantly forward, "The spirit of the sun has sustained her."

"You have triggered a great problem Lanus, for discarding a named kit is not so easy as an unnamed one." Chalan screamed and wailed in agony as the Sentinel dropped her even lower towards the fire.

Lanus roared in anger lunging forward and throwing four of the five guards to the ground with a sudden surge of anger. He thundered across the floor hand drawn, preparing for a killing blow.

"STOP! Do not make your son suffer the consequences."

Lanus stopped mid attack looking up to find Kanan, his son, held by spear point to his throat. The young Drev was wide-eyed with confusion and pain as the two guards mercilessly drove him to his knees, "Father -" the youngling entreated in confusion. "Mother - "

Kazna looked up now, reacting for the first time since they had stepped onto the floor. "Lanus," she warned. "Know your place. I will not lose my son today."

A shadow passed over Lanus's face, "But you would watch your daughter burn?

Kanan groaned in pain under the ruthless treatment of the two guards, "It's – alright – father - help her." The young Drev was rapped swiftly over the head with the end of a spear butt, painfully lurching forward with a cry of shock.

The benevolence of his son's words drove Lanus to his knees trapped between his two children. How could he choose between them?

He couldn’t.

The four guards he had thrown off earlier surrounded him once again making it clear they would not fail in their assignment again.

For now, the Sentinel had pulled Chalan away from the flames eyeing Lanus and Kazna critically, "For one who failed to throw her crippled child into the fire, you don't seem concerned, Kazna."

The general lifted her head, eyes cold and steely with only a shard of shame. "It was a moment of weakness. I have since recognized my error."

The Sentinel brushed a finger over the Kit's cheek, "Clearly not enough to return and do what you should have done when she was born."

Kazna lowered her head.

With the kit cradled in her arms, the Sentinel looked towards the Magnate, "What say you old one, what shall be done? The child is named, and it would be displeasing to the spirits were we to deal with her as if she were not."

The Magnate nodded his head stiffly looking down at the child with an expression of unconcealed disgust. The tiny kit wriggled and cried with the fiery pain that still ached in her little limbs.

"Please…" Lanus begged resolutely, "Please...."

Somewhere in the darkness Kanan choked against the spear at his throat.

The Sentinel lifted her beautiful head towards the ceiling, eyes shrouded, head tilted as if she was listening. Slowly her head lowered and her eyes released, "I may...have the answer."

The room was as silent as a stony sepulcher, and not even the echoing of heavy armor could be heard. "We shall deal with her like all those named who are disfigured with injury or old age." With one sweeping gesture of her scepter, she motioned to the two static acolytes, still standing with the spear and respective bowl of coals, to come forward into the circle.

"No!" Lanus said, "You can't, she's just a child, she doesn't understand!"

"Silence yourself!" The Magnate spat, and the fifth guard clamped a hand about Lanus's muzzle silencing him with impunity. He struggled, but was forcibly kept silent.

Together, the two acolytes gently knelt and placed their offerings on the floor. The Sentinel crouched low and placed the kit on the floor before backing away.

The floor itself was cool, the cold soothing Chalan’s burning skin, a soft chirping replaced the cries. Her tiny beak turned this way and that searching desperately for comfort, but the Magnate and Sentinel blocked her view. The chirping grew more earnest and pleading, and together, they waited for the kit to choose.

The kit inched across the ground and away from the looming figures overhead, but she was corralled with only one way out. The chirping had died into a piteous moaning, but Chalan crawled onwards coming to a stop just before the spear and the bowl.

Somewhere in the room Lanus wrestled silently with his captors. The hall was a tomb, cold and silent and breathless. General Kazna turned away from the scene.

Mesmerized by the glowing embers, Chalan scooted forward, golden eyes bright and glittering. The Magnate readied himself to scoop up the child and prepare her for sacrifice.

Lanus moaned against his silenced mouth and struggled even harder. All five of the guards strained to pin him to the floor, and even then, his power was almost too much for them to counter.

With one tiny hand, Chalan reached out as if to pick up one of the embers, but as soon as the kit's hand neared the outside of the bowl she recognized the painful heat of the stone, chirped in fear and began to crawl away, instead placing her tiny hands on the cold metal of the spear. With a soft cry, she curled into a ball face pressed against the cold steel to soothe the aching, for no mercy could be found from the dark and looming figures above her.

The Magnate stood straight and lifted his head to the sky above, "The spirits have spoken." Looking down towards the small sapphire kit he continued, "The child will be allowed to remain in the clan. She will prove her worth through battle or die by the blade."

With a sharp click, he motioned the acolytes into movement.

The embers were cast into the fire, and the spear was whisked away into the darkness. The Sentinel, together with the Magnate, turned with the soft swishing of fabrics and vanished into the darkness. As soon as their figures were no longer visible, the room broke into a cacophony of voices raising like a tsunami towards the pinnacle of the ceiling.

The spear was withdrawn from Kanan's throat, and he was allowed to slump onto his hands and knees coughing and moaning. A few of the Drev soldiers knelt to see if he was injured.

Lanus was finally released from his captive position, and as soon as he was able to move freely, he scrambled across the floor to where Chalan was still curled chirping piteously in pain. "Chalan...Chalan…I'm so sorry." Delicately, and with his lower set of hands, he picked her up off the floor cradling her protectively against his midriff.

Sensing someone familiar, the kit began to chirp fervently.

"Shh, I'm here. I'm here. You are safe." His voice was quiet, barely an audible whisper.

A few of the soldiers stayed behind to watch the drama unfold, but many had turned their backs and were walking out the doors in orderly lines. Kanan struggled to his feet watching with wide eyes as the others trickled through the doors, only his father and mother remained standing on the floor below.

Lanus had opened his mouth to speak to Kazna, but upon seeing Kanan he changed his mind, "Return to your practice, son. I will speak to you soon.”

"But, father -"

"Please Kanan," the young Drev did not argue, but couldn't help but look over his shoulder as he exited through the wide double doors.

When they were finally alone, Lanus turned on Kazna, face twisted into an expression of rage. Kasna stood unyielding with her back to him, not daring to look into his eyes which flashed a mixture of disappointment, anger, confusion, and something approaching disdain.

"How...could...you?" he censured sharply.

Kasna didn't look at him, and the room was silent but for the kit's whimpering.

"You - shame me, Kazna."

His words struck like prongs of glass buried in the skin. She turned suddenly, golden eyes alight with anger, "No, you shame yourself, if you had just-"

"No, I will not take this from you! You made a choice that day Kazna: you chose to let her live, and I supported your decision because we paired. And now, now that we finally have what we want, you want to destroy it because you are a coward. I know what you are doing, you're taking out your own weakness on her, and I will-not-have-it!"

Two golden capes billowed behind him as he stormed past her. Stopping short he turned his head in her direction trying to make eye contact. His words were so soft that they barely registered over the cracking fire, yet nothing could hide the horrible power of his anger. "As a battle pair, we made an oath to protect, defend and honor one another, but in my time of greatest need you abandoned me...and now I find myself wishing... that I had never stepped into that circle."

Somewhere in the darkness, a single pocket of moisture was caught by the fire, popping violently with a great shedding of sparks.

Embers floated in the air for a moment, like bright red stars in the night sky, only to fade back into their evanescent embers and vanish.


	7. Chapter 7

The human digestive tract evolved with the breakdown of extremely tough substances and the elimination of bacteria in mind. For this reason human digestive juices contain hydroelectric acid (with a ph of 1-2), potassium chloride (used in lethal injection), and sodium chloride (salt). This cocktail of gastric acid has a ph strength of 1-3 and has the capabilities to dissolve metal. Species particularly vulnerable to the effects of acid should be advised on the proper disposal of a human body, and are encouraged to stay clear of humans suffering certain illnesses that may shift the acid outside the body.

"Have your senses completely left you, Physician?"

The Trauma Center's chief director and Dr. Krill's chief paced around his office in a frantic tizzy as Dr. Krill stood quietly by the viewing field staring out at the lonesome grey sky. Despite a covering of atmospheric haze, their neighboring gas giant hung as a large crescent scar of hazy white against the soft grey backdrop.

"Are you even paying attention?" his superior demanded. At this point the Gibb had worked himself up, voice rising to decibel levels that many other species would have found difficult to hear, but despite his superior's raised voice, Dr. Krill simply turned a calm eye upon the Gibb as he hopped about in a frenzy. This was normal for his superior, even on a good day—a product of the Gibb temperament.

"I have dedicated more than half my lifecycle to the conservation and development of this hospital, and I will not have a confused and selfish surgeon ruining our situation, our good will with the Vrul council.”

Dr. Krill had always assumed that he possessed an immense well of patience, due to the countless hours of quiet, patient study required to reach his level of skill and talent. However, he was beginning to discover that he was not, in fact, patient when it came to listening to useless, pointless, bumbling idiocy.

"I assure you, Director," he cut in forcibly, "I have made my decision logically. The universe has been lacking in progressive discovery and scientific knowledge over the past few cycles. Advancement in the field of medical science has all but ground to a halt, an issue that troubles me immensely. The humans-"

"Enough! Enough with the humans, Surgeon. You have done your duty for them and completed your involvement; furthermore, the galactic community has no need for scientific study on a primitive species. Your job is to keep them alive, and let them leave."

Krill’s antenna hummed in barely controlled anger, "Those are the thoughts of an ignorant and pompous species. These 'creatures' are remarkable, and you would understand that if you had simply taken the time to read my medical report. Furthermore-" he raised his voice in an attempt to stay over the director’s shouted words. "Furthermore, any opportunity we have to learn from these creatures should be accepted with all due haste! Can you imagine what we could accomplish if we had the knowledge to perform work on cortical tissue?"

"That is not your-“

" These humans may well be the gateway into a new era of medical science, and it would be irresponsible of us to ignore this fact as doing so handicaps us from fully serving all life."

The Director spun in an exasperated circle throwing his two limbs up into the air in a demonstration of his extreme frustration. "Perhaps, one might be willing to believe your reasoning, but the fact of that you are not doing this for the medical community."

The two of them were standing across from each other separated by ever decreasing territory in a demonstration of unusual aggression for either of their races. "The reason," the Director continued, "you are so interested in the humans has nothing to do with the medical community and everything to do with your insatiable need to show off, and your selfish disregard for the communal good. You want this out of pure curiosity, to the detriment of your own species, this station and the medical community."

Doctor Krill grew very still even though the incessant humming of his lateral antenna filled his head. He couldn’t continue his argument; Gibb never changed their minds once made.

There was only one thing to do, "If that is the way you feel Director, then I am afraid I must tender my resignation effective immediately, and hope that I find employment that needs and wants both my curiosity and my desire to do more good in this universe."

The wall melded closed behind him, but the voice of the Director did not abate as he had followed Krill from the office with a shriek of disapproval and a frantic waving of his upper limbs.

"Have you have lost your mind? Did you even think this through?" The questions continued to spill forth as the two of them rounded the next corner breaking through a group of medical assistants who, with curious eyes, followed the pair’s continual progress down the hall.

"You demonstrate your ignorance of me by asking those questions," the doctor snapped sharply. The Director nearly ran himself into a wall as they cut sharply around another corner. "I am a Vrul. Certainly, I weighed the pros and cons, I made lists, I ran statistics, and I have found the costs both monetary and medicinal that would occur in my absence to be minimal. While my value to you is not in my skill alone but the speed at which I work. If you hire three more doctors in my absence, there will be no decrease in productivity and care, and if they are Vrul, you need not worry about monetary compensation. Furthermore, my skills and talents are useless here as all the procedure, which only I can perform, are unquestionably infrequent and uncommon here. In short, my skills surpass the needs of this center.

Instead of understanding this logic, the Director only became more infuriated by the doctor’s words. Stepping outside under the light of a murky orange sky, painted by the setting sun, the Director was hopping with rage.

"The council will hear about this. You will be recalled, and perhaps discharged!” At this point, his ranting had attracted much attention as medical assistants, lab techs, and doctors on their breaks turned to see the cause of the commotion.

Observing this, the Director regained his senses and lowered his voice, but the damage had already been done. There were some species in the vicinity who would be able to pick up the radio signals shed from their conversation. "You would throw away the core principles of your species to go chasing after an aspiration, and as for the rest of your claims,-"

Dr. Krill stood quietly, silently resting the flats of his upper appendages against each other, looking vaguely reminiscent of a praying mantis at that moment; unemotional, and waiting patiently to emotionally destroy this creature when the chance arose.

"You would force three of your kin to leave their planet to replace you, so that you can go gallivanting across space trying to research a primitive species? And abandon your directive, your talents and countless future patients?"

Dr. Krill felt nothing at the words, though, of course, there was a part of him that knew the Gibb was right: most of the Vrul only ever left their world on the command of the council in order to fulfill the agreement that they had made with the assembly. However, after years of practicing medicine on his own planet where disease had been eradicated, and individual Vrul were generally too cautious to get injured, Krill had requested to leave. At the time, it had caused a quite a stir. He could only imagine the results of what he was about to do.

He took his time responding, allowing the Director to stew in his anger and disappointment. "I reject your dismissal of my logical reasonings. Many think intergalactic relations will be held together through minimal contact or collaboration. That somehow, if we interact only when necessary, then peace will naturally prevail. I disagree." He turned to look up at their fading star and the slowly brightening sky illuminated by the gargantuan glowing disk of their neighboring gas giant. "Besides," he pointed out softly, "If I am so selfish and problematic, then would not the logical option be to send me away where I can do no harm or infect others with my poisonous thoughts and choices?"

He would have liked to walk away leaving the Gibb in stunned silence, but stunned silence wasn't exactly a Gibb's strong suit. The Director lifted his arms towards the cosmos as if admonishing the stars themselves to fall from the sky and convince the doctor of how irrational he was being. "You leave me no choice, Doctor. I am sending you back home effective immediately, for your health. Clearly, we have been ignoring your mental health and stability for too long."

The doctor remained calm although under the surface he was feeling a new emotion begin to bubble up. "You do not hold that power, but let me make this quite clear and easy. I am vacating my post," he held up a hand, "and our discussion is at an end. I just had my assistant transmit my resignation to the council directly. If they have an issue they are more than welcome to take it up with me directly."

The doctor let his lateral antenna vibrate with a short radio burst, and before the Director could continue his argument the doctor had boarded a rail transport, and was shooting across the open square towards the medical bay, leaving the Gibb standing stunned within a ring of shocked onlookers.

Dr. Krill was only now beginning to feel the implications of his actions. Of course, his decision was not a rash, unplanned action. He had spent days researching the humans, communication with other scientists, contacting old associates, and above all, exploring the pros and cons of the decision before him. And there seemed to be no question that more good would come from this than bad. The absence of a single doctor from this trauma center would not negatively affect the care that was available. Furthermore, they did not require his abilities on his home planet, so they were unlikely to need it in the future. However, if they were to ostracize him on the grounds of illogical and selfish behavior...

He supposed he could live with that.

After all, he had already come to terms with his decision while sitting in his office and mentally replaying the infuriating words of that human as they repeated over and over in his head.

He was bored, and he was wasting his knowledge and abilities… and he hated how right the human was.

The railed transport pulled to a stop, allowing him to gently float to the floor before the patient’s doorway. The wall ahead of him melted to reveal the dark, isolated interior of the patient’s room.

The human was there, as before, sitting on the edge of the bed, his hand held in front of him flexing and unflexing it with the curiosity. However, as soon as Krill stepped into the room, the hand dropped and the human sat up straighter. The bodily expression, which he took was unknown to Krill but included a sudden relaxed drop of the shoulders and a tilted head. Its mouth opened to breathe a sigh, and its eyebrows raised slightly. The unknown expression immediately morphed into a "smile" as the human had called it.

"Morning Doc," the human greeted, though Krill didn't entirely understand the phrase. Hopefully the algorithms would adapt over time

He had not known the humans for very long, but he did know they were infuriatingly bad at speaking properly and clearly.

The humans face dropped a bit, mouth making an oh in realization before starting again, "Good Morning, Doctor."

"Is it?" Krill wondered, absently floating forward to begin removing sensors and tubes from the human's exposed skin.

The human tilted its large head towards him, single eye blinking unnervingly at him, "What are you doing?"

The doctor stepped back with the last sensor in his hand and turned to shut off the machines, "You want to go back to your ship don't you?"

In response, the human perked up, "Hell yeah, of course I do. I'm bored out of my mind, and if I am confined any longer my body may disappear while my mind melds into the ether."

"What?"

"What?"

"Nevermind," the doctor said, shuffling to the side of the bed as the human stood, stretching his bulky frame, the muscles on his back and chest growing taught.

"I will only allow you to leave if your promise to do something for me.”

The human threaded his arms through a second layer of clothing, adjusting the open front with two hands. One of the little furry lines above his eyes rose, and he crossed his arms. Krill wasn't sure what to make of the expression or the posture. It seemed self-protecting in nature, seeing as the ribcage protected the chest, but the way the muscle moved to fall into place made sure to highlight the heavy muscles in the forearms and biceps.

Could it be issuing a challenge?

The human shifted his weight onto one foot, leaving himself intentionally off balance.

"Anything, what do you want?" a strange glint appeared in the human's eye. Krill couldn't have explained how, the only thing the eye could do was contract, expand, or move a bit, but somehow the strange expression still remained.

"You want out of this trauma center, and so do I. You allow me onto your ship as your primary medical officer, and we both get what we want." The doctor tapped one of his four feet thoughtfully on the floor below. "This is an excellent arrangement for you as you and your ship will benefit far more than I."

The human’s cheek twitched slightly dragging the right side of his mouth up for an instant while that single eye remained cocked in its earlier position. "Oh really?" He paused thoughtfully, corners of his mouth dropping into a downward 'smile,' "I can understand why you may think that, but I'm not so sure."

Krill felt his nerves bubbling up inside of him. Had he read the human wrong? But… he had offered, hadn’t he? Was there some strange custom that he missed?

The human rubbed the back of his neck ponderously, "Until five days ago you had never even performed brain surgery, so I'm am understandably concerned over whether or not you can handle a human crew." The gleam in the human's eyes exploded, dancing like a small flame. The corners of his mouth twitched sporadically as he spoke, as if the muscle was attempting to hold itself in place despite protest.

"Are you asking for my credentials human, because all you have to do is look at yourself in a mirror to see my abilities. You are not brain dead or drooling all over yourself, so we can safely assume I am able to quickly master human anatomy and surgery."

Instead of growing offended or arguing with him, the creature's face broke into a very wide 'smile' displaying two rows of glittering white teeth. And then came the strange noise, it rose up from deep inside the human’s chest warping and breaking as it was forced up through his mouth. It came in bursts like the revving of an engine on a string of sharp exhales.

Krill had never heard a creature make a sound like that before.

“You make an excellent argument doctor. I accept. Now, why don’t we get continue this conversation on my ship?”

Walking next to the human, Dr. Krill was becoming quite sure that the creature had been playing him. He wasn't entirely sure why he thought that, as he wasn't as adept at reading human facial expressions or body postures as he would have liked to be, and he was also becoming increasingly more certain that human tonal variations were a very important part of their communication process.

For Krill, the human voice was at the lower end of his hearing register, but still audible. There were occasions when the human's voice would jump up in the register making it easier for Krill to detect, but that generally came paired with the strange twitching in the human's cheeks as if he was holding back a smile.

Krill wasn't stupid, in fact, testing with human IQ measures would have been ridiculous as he was so far above a human’s ability to quantify. But that did him no good as he was positive the human was giving him signals he could not yet read.

Walking down the halls together, they drew more attention than Krill was comfortable with. The human kept up a steady stream of conversation. Krill would have labeled the human as overly talkative if the information wasn't useful. "As you are probably aware by now, I am Captain Vir of the U.N.S.S Harbinger, a second generation intergalactic vessel under the command of the UNSC and on loan to the GA as a token of peace and cooperation between humankind and extraterrestrial life." They took a corner, and Krill was finding it hard to keep up with the human's long, powerful strides, which seemed to practically eat up the floor's distance as they went. "My standing orders are to foster intergalactic relations, conduct research and exploration, and promote intergalactic peace while protecting all species, from tyranny, war, and subjugation."

"A lot is expected of you," Dr. Krill said, dodging a cart of medical supplies as it came trundling down the hallway.

The human gestured by raising his shoulders and then lowering them again. "I suppose, but our obligations don’t end there.”

“How is that?”

The human clasped his hands behind his back, “Nearly six months into my deployment, I received word from my superiors of 41 missing humans. Now in comparison to our numbers 41 is strikingly large, and by all accounts it should be impossible for anyone to go missing. Yet 41 people have without a trace over the past five years. We need to find these men, and save them if we can, or stop whatever is going on from continuing.” He dropped his hands from behind his back, one of them drifting up to touch the patch over his missing eye, “In fact, we were headed here when the accident happened.”

“Why would you come here? You were the first human we have ever encountered.”

“So I learned.”

“Is that what you were doing when I caught you out of bed?”

The human turned his head to look down, “As it so happens, yes. You’re very perceptive doctor. I was fishing for information.”

“You could have just asked me.”

A flash of teeth, “I suppose that would have been the logical course of action.”

The two of them pressed through the docking field doors, and stepped outside under the light of the night sky. The human paused in his tracks, single eye reflecting the light of their gas giant. He stood there for a long moment as if mesmerized by the sky above before shaking himself and continuing on, intent on the angular black monolith dominating the launch field.

Krill still had to struggle to keep up.

Small black forms scuttled around the base of the ship and by using his thermal receptors, Krill was able to determine that those black dots were other humans, likely prepping or preparing the ship for travel.

The small doctor scuttled forward a little faster cutting the human off and causing him to draw to a halt. "Now listen here human. It is important that when I come aboard your ship my accommodations will be to my specifications."

The human stepped to the side intending to walk around him, "I'll see what I can do."

But Krill blocked his movement again. He knew the human needed him despite how he was acting. "No, that's not how this works. It's up to my specifications, or nothing... am I understood?"

Another raised eyebrow, the gesture partially obscured by the black patch that now covered the missing organ, "You're kind of bossy, you know that?"

"Yes, but my species prefers the term assertive."

The strange revving noise broke from the human's throat as he pushed past Krill and continued walking down the field. He glanced over his shoulder as Krill scuttled after him, "You have my word, that I will try."

-

The sound of a human ship igniting its engines is an experience the doctor determined should be a once in a lifetime experience.

He didn’t mean once in a lifetime experience in the same way that certain planets advertise unforgettable or incredible vacations. He meant the kind of once in a lifetime experience that is only once in a lifetime, because you may not be alive to experience it a second time.

He was 90 percent positive that the human had loitered outside on purpose.

The ignition had begun with a distant rumbling accompanied by a whining hiss, but as the seconds wore on the rumbling grew into a steady tremor and then a rattling quake that seemed determined to tear the ground apart, but it got worse, so much worse. The hiss turned into a screaming and then a shrieking and then a roaring and then a culmination of the three. If he didn’t know better, Krill would have assumed that their star had plunged through space and broken through the atmospheric barrier. The day, which had been quite still before now, had suddenly whipped itself up into a thunderous cacophony of screaming wind and swirling dust forcing the doctor into an uncontrolled skid back across the tarmac, four limbs held up in front of his face desperately trying to block the thundering gale.

Ahead of him, the human stood sure footed and grounded on the tarmac, large black boots spread to shoulder width, brown jacket whipping around him in the breeze, face turned to the roaring torrent. Above the human, the fading sun was just allowing their neighboring gas giant to sharpen against the light-scattered atmosphere outlining the dark monolith of a ship with its blue rings. Tawny hair lightened by the fire of the engines, the human turned a predatory smile to the doctor exposing too many teeth and too much mouth skin. The green of his eye flashed with silent, unmistakable joy.

This was a ship made by predators for predators.

The doctor struggled against the continued roaring as he was forced back another two feet. He grew dizzy against the onslaught barely aware when the human walked the few feet back to assist him forward, one hand at his dorsal side. Together, they made their way up the hydraulic ramp and into the belly of the daunting monolith. His attached helium sack billowed and snapped painfully in the wind threatening to tear off and go tumbling across the tarmac.

The ship itself was a brutal piece of engineering, blocky and rough without the refined curves of a Rundi ship, or the jutting warlike points of a Burg short-cruiser. It had the aesthetic appeal of a metal cube.

Six massive engines were obviously the only reason this monstrosity could launch itself into space. There was a set of two rear thrusters, another two on the midline and the remaining two at the front. The doctor’s outer view of the ship vanished behind a thick metal wall, and the sound of the engines were cut off as the ramp hissed closed with a sharp thud and accompanying click. Looking forward, he was met with a demonstration of organized chaos the likes of which he had never thought possible.

Krill could not discern any sense of organization, and no way the humans should have been able to operate without running headlong into each other; yet they seemed to operated like a hive mind, somehow managing to avoid any terrible disaster while still maintaining all the grace and coordination of a meteorite collision. Together they weaved through pools of shadow and light ducking, swerving, and wriggling past each other with a strange chaotic ease.

Next to him, the human took a deep, exaggerated breath, eyes closing as the muscles of his upper cheek contracted to pull up the corners of his mouth. With his right hand, the human stroked the smooth metal of the ship’s interior. When his hand gently came away Krill could see that the dark grey color had eroded, and a shiny silver smudge could be seen glittering from underneath, as if it had been worn away from many such caresses.

“That’s my girl,” the human crooned softly under his breath.

Krill only understood the possessive pronoun, and couldn’t have guessed why the human would be whispering to himself. Not that it mattered, for the human turned his one startlingly green eye upon Krill before raising his arms to gesture wildly around the ship. The entire movement was greatly exaggerated and would have exposed all of the creature’s internal organs for any potential attack, “Doctor, welcome to the U.N.S.S Harbinger.” An expression, now familiar to the doctor, returned with greater enthusiasm, “What do you think of her?”

The doctor took another look around at the cluttered cavern; poorly lit, blocky and rough interior, like whoever had made it wasn’t entirely sure what they were doing, or they had been suspended upside down when trying to read the instruction manual, “You flew here… on this?”

The human’s smile fell and he suddenly lowered his chin to cover the soft spot of his neck. He stepped aggressively or defensively in front of Krill as if he was shielding the ship from Krill’s words or threatening to attack Krill for his observations. A dark shadow passed over his eye as the angle of light was adjusted. Krill shrunk back slightly against the overt show of aggression.

“Now hold on just a minute. I know she doesn’t look like much but she’s the best ship this side of Andromeda, and I won’t have you disrespecting her like that.”

A group of humans passed by just then working in unison to carry one of the blocky crates that made up most of the landscape in this strange place. Krill couldn’t help but notice the way their feet moved, how the muscles rolled up and down their backs and legs with sinuous grace.

“Nice eye patch,” one of them called over his shoulder as the others chorused their agreement.

Of course, the doctor’s presence did not go unnoticed, and he couldn’t help but shiver at the six pairs of eyes which remained locked on him as they passed, the black apertures of their eyes contracting and zeroing in on him like an automated targeting system.

The human turned away from his retreating companions to place his focus back on Krill, “I know she’s not as nice as your GA long-cruisers, or even the GA’s Imperium, but she’s got something that theirs doesn’t.”

“Hull rot?” Krill wondered as the two of them began walking down the outer edge of the cavern.

Finally, he saw a new expression and he didn’t much like it. The little furry lines above the human’s eye sockets had coalesced into a V and the corners of the mouth had dragged down. The head tilted, but the neck was not exposed.

“I would say you’re trying to be funny, but something tells me that’s not something they do on your planet, so my only other conclusion is that you are making fun of my ship, and understand this doctor, no one disrespects or makes fun of ... my...ship. You have now been warned, twice.”

The way the human looked at him just then demonstrated there was something worse on a human than an empty expression. Krill was just about ready to turn around and disembark, when the man’s expression switched suddenly back to a relaxed smile. “She’s second generation on intergalactic travel, patterned on the original forerunner design, sort of meant to be a smaller copy of our very first iteration. So she’s a forerunner model battle class with an Alpha-1 warp core.” A group of large humans in strange patterned clothing stopped in front of them placing themselves in an uncannily straight line.

Krill nearly jumped out of his skin as, in perfect synchronization, the humans raised their hands at an acute angle to bring their fattened palms horizontally against their temples, “Captain on deck!” came a booming announcement.

“At ease, Marines.”

The group of humans dropped their hands in synchronization, “Wicked eyepatch,” one of them commented on their way past. Krill watched mesmerized as their feet pounded across the deck in an uncannily perfect rhythm.

“The Alpha-1 rating has to do entirely with the Bernthal Equation. You see, the further the distance to warp means the greater amount of space the ship has to fold in order to create a viable wormhole. As you would imagine, a Delta-5 class warp can really only get you across a single solar system. However, as it turns out the actual initiation of a fold is the hard part, and the more you try to fold the more the universe sort of just…follows the stuff you have already folded, so after a certain point you don’t need to exert any more power. Any warp core rated with an Alpha drive can, theoretically, cover the entire distance of the universe in one warp. However, the number that comes after its class is related to the number of times the warp core can do an alpha warp before requiring replacement. This ship has an Alpha-1 warp core, meaning she could go across the universe about 10 times before shutting down, a Charlie core can get you interstellar, a Bravo core can go intergalactic, but only an Alpha core has the theoretic capability to go trans-universal.”

Krill stopped to stare at the human blankly, “How fast is your ship exactly?”

The human shrugged, “Slow doc, slow as a snail on parade. It takes up to three weeks to get across the solar system just on our own power.”

“Not even half light-“

The human rumbled a low repetitive growl in his chest “Hell no, this isn’t Star Wars. Light speed or half of it is a ridiculous dream that comes with more problems than it does uses. You think our power output is ridiculous, well light speed is just stupid, plus then you have to deal with time dilation, thanks but no thanks. I would like to go home and visit my family on occasion, not stay young and watch them grow old and die from a distance. Thank you very much.”

Krill almost ran himself into the next doorframe staring at the human in wonder. Every other species known in the universe had originally begun with light speed before moving on to warp tunnels, but the humans, instead of first attempting to work within the bounds of the universe, had immediately moved to forcing the universe to literally bend to their will.

They passed out the open docking bay and into a dark, cramped tunnel teaming with humans scuttling around with their strange predatory nature, eyes falling on Krill and tracking him slowly as he went past. Unconsciously, the doctor scooted closer to the protective cover of the human’s legs attempting to conceal himself from the hungry predatory gazes that followed him through the tube.

Of course, the human noticed none of this, remaining obliviously relaxed for one of the greatest apex predators in the known galaxy, waving his upper extremities at the other humans, and barking greetings with his powerful, human vocals. The humans growled, hooted, hissed and barked their greetings back. Krill noticed early on that humans seem to have a subconscious need to touch one another.

The first greeting involved wrapping two hands together and oscillating them up and down a few times, the second appeared to Krill to be an aggressive show of domination where the humans slapped their open palms together, probably in some primitive domination ritual.

The last greeting was the most aggressive, it included trying to crush another human with full torso contact by interlocked their upper extremities. Despite the violent nature of the greetings, the humans seemed to enjoy it, spending most of their greeting ritual “smiling.”

Body language seemed to be a very important component of human social interaction.

“Hey, Nairobi!” The human bellowed, pointing out one of the humans passing in the dark metal tunnel. This human was excessively tall, almost an inch taller than the captain. She had ebony skin, gold eyes and was lacking the fur many of the humans produced atop their heads. This human wore a grey jumpsuit with dark stains.

Krill was fascinated by the different colors of the humans. Was it due to biology, environment, and/or genetics and he wondered how many different colors humans came in. The Vrul came in a variation of brown and grey tones, but these humans, well there was no end to variety. The humans’ fur…no hair…was also a multitude of colors, lengths and textures. Features, height, and weight were also not uniform. This was a very eclectic species. Their origin planet must be quite something to spawn such a diverse and interesting species.

“How’s my girl?” the captain inquired, “didn’t miss me too much, did she?”

The dark human snorted a loud gust of air from its nose, “Missed you, she got a well-deserved break from you.”

Who was this she they were talking about?

The captain waved a hand, “Oh come on, you worry too much. What is the point of having an advanced warship if you don’t use her to her full capacity?”

Golden eyes rolled hard, “Using her to her full capacity, and testing her past the point of her best operational curve does not mean the same thing.”

“Just gotta take the fun out of everything don’t you?” he said bouncing up the hallway on the balls of his feet.

“HEY CAP!”

The captain turned around, walking backwards with the same seamless ease as he walked forward still forcing the doctor to struggle to keep up with him.

“Yeah?’

The ebony human motioned to the captain’s face, “You aren’t a space pirate, so ditch the eye patch. You look stupid.”

“Love you too, Nairobi.” The captain laughed, turning up the dark path, cutting in and out through swarms of humans who parted in surprise when they saw Krill scuttling after. Together they moved through a tight maze of unfinished hallways ducking past exposed steel piping, and squeezing through cramped doorways.

The human ship was a veritable warren of tunnels, rooms, and tightly cramped spaces all lined with exposed wiring, piping, and essential equipment. Out of context, Krill would never have guessed that it was a ship, but rather an underground fortress, dimly lit. If not that, perhaps the carcass of some long forgotten beast, and here they were crawling through its bowels like the parasitic interlopers that they were.

Ahead of him, the human squeezed through a particularly tight door, “Almost there,” he muttered.

From there, they clambered up a set of solid, yet narrow, steel stairs and through another doorway. The humans here were wearing similar outfits of light grey diverging from the dark grey uniforms he had seen earlier.

As they passed into this tunnel, the humans paused to acknowledge their captain, also using it as an opportunity to stare at Krill, in that strange, unnerving way they had.

The captain, of course, made no sign he noticed, too busy greeting his pack members sometimes nodding and sometimes returning their strange hand gestures.

The captain and Krill moved up one last flight of stairs, and the doorway before them opened into a large semicircular room of grey steel. The outer walls of the room were lined with consoles displaying a dizzying number of buttons, dials, screens and projections. Lights blinked and flashed as many voices overlapped each other. At each console sat a human. In an even greater array of shapes, sizes, colors and features.

Krill was almost in awe… Almost.


	8. Chapter 8

With training, it is possible for a human to hold their breath up to nine minutes, though the attempt is not strictly advisable for the average human who can only hold their breath comfortably for thirty seconds to a minute. 

“CAPTAIN ON DECK!”

Captain Vir couldn’t wipe the delighted smile from his face. Man it felt good to be back.

“At ease,” he ordered, more than a little ecstatic at how this moment made him feel. Six months as captain of a spaceship and it still got him every time.

Not everyone gets to live their childhood dream.

He stepped onto the deck with the familiar thudding of boots motioning to one of his crew, “Initiate the ignition sequence.” He could have squealed and jumped up and down like a little girl with how giddy that made him feel, but he forced himself to remain calm and composed.

It wouldn’t do for the captain of the U.N.S.S Harbinger to make a fool of himself on the bridge.

He paused just for a second and took a deep breath before sliding into the captain’s chair, immediately feeling absolutely euphoric and humbled. He glanced over his shoulder towards the doctor who seemed to be staring at him with a studious expression. Either that or this alien always looked studious.

Either way, it didn’t matter. At his command the preflight checklist popped up in his vision.

He missed the weight of his old notebook, but now that he was a ship captain it was antiquated and clumsy.

“Preflight?” he asked.

“Checked and rechecked again.”

He was sure they had, but still, “I think we should check it one more time. Don’t you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Engines?”

“Charging to ten percent Captain, maintenance checks have been performed, and all preflight diagnostics reflect optimum status, sir.”

“That’s what I like to hear. Now keep it coming. Give me a crew count, please.” He leaned back in his seat kicking his feet up as he spun around in a circle watching the ceiling go spinning by in a dizzying array of light and metal. He held out his hands, a feeling of pure bliss rising in his chest.

“All crew present and accounted for, sir. Rear hanger doors are locked and secure, and all excess cargo has been secured.” Below their feet the ship began to rumble.

“Navigations, set a course for our next scheduled destination,” he paused the spinning of his chair and tilted his head towards the new crew member, “You might want to strap yourself in, doctor, this ship isn’t exactly graceful in atmo.”

He turned his chair back around, summoning a holo-projection, and his captain’s controls.

“Charged to ten percent, sir.”

The floor below them was thrumming with life, strong and powerful.

“Ignition in 10...9...8...”

He reached out with fingers tingling from excitement to engage the manual controls: two joysticks and two peddles, and three holo-screens, showing altitude, pitch, yaw, power, and trajectory.

7...6...5...

Reaching down with his left hand he engaged a switch on the left side of his console before depressing the small red button he knew would be at its side.

“Crewmembers of the U.N.S.S Harbinger, this is your captain speaking. I advise you to strap in if you haven’t already, or risk braining yourself on the nearest sharp object. You have been warned.”

Technically they had all signed a waiver when they boarded the ship about that particular possibility, but just to be safe…

“4.... 3... 2...”

This was by far the best part of his crap week.

“One”

Somewhere below them, the engines roared to life with the fury of an igniting star as atoms fused themselves together to create a surge of glorious power.

All thought was purged from his head, and his eyes focused forward on the screens as the massive ship raised herself into the air. As big as the ship was, atmospheric conditions made his flight hell. She was never meant to take off in atmosphere, and she didn’t seem intent on starting now. But with a little gentle coaxing, he got her into the air guiding her with the firm hand of a guardian.

“Lieutenant, engage outer hull cameras.”

“Yes, sir.”

His body pulled against his restraints.

“Engaging interior gravity field.”

The sensation was gone as soon as it had come, and the rattling of the engines dissipated. Below them, the pallid grey face of the planet rotated into darkness.

“Lieutenant, command is yours,” he yielded, undoing his belts and sliding onto the deck to find the little alien rigid and practically white knuckling his seat restraints, “That wasn’t so bad doc. It’s time to show you the ship. You’ll love her, she’s a beauty.”

He was about to step out of the door when he noticed the other crew members staring at the doctor, again. He spun on his boot-heel, “Ah, forgive me for not introducing you sooner. Everyone meet our new chief medical officer, Doctor Krill who, in his own words, is the premier medical professional this side of Andromeda.”

A murmuring rose up around the room.

The little doctor simply stood there staring at the crew, who without polite etiquette stared back. Captain Vir nudged him with a leg. “Anything to say doctor?”

At his urging, the doctor shook himself and straightened up, “It is not my own claim. I am the preeminent medical professional and surgeon in the galaxy having been awarded the title by the Galactic Assembly and the Intergalactic Medical Association.”

The captain grinned, patting the doctor on the head with his free hand, “Hear that everyone, stole him right out from under the nose of the GA, and now he’s all ours.” The murmuring grew louder. “You can’t say that I don’t take care of my crew.”

He heard the muttering continue behind his back as he ushered the Vrul out into the hall.

He knew his methods were a little unorthodox, but he was sure they would thank him later. An alien doctor was better than no doctor. The next step was convincing the UNSC to let a nonmilitary civilian aboard the ship…without prior approval or vetting.

He would figure out how to convince the brass, later.

Right now, it was his job to show the new guest around his ship. His lieutenant was capable of navigating the ship while he familiarized the doctor with his new home. Of course, he had other motives too. It wasn’t every day that you got to make a best friend who was an alien because they were going to be best friends whether the doctor knew it or not.

The crew needed a doctor and so the captain rolled out the red carpet with a personal tour, friendly conversation and some grandstanding. He showed the doctor around the ship in a crash course of names places and locations. It was probably the informational equivalent of getting a firehose full blast to the face, but the little creature was a doctor after all; he could handle it.

"And that's why we keep the engine room far away from the crew quarters," he finished, hand raised to emphasize his point. They were just passing through another cramped doorway when, all of a sudden, he caught his right foot on the edge of the door. With a yelp of surprise and hands flailing he grabbed onto the edge of the doorframe as he was forced to hop with his good leg to maintain balance.

"Son of a -" he wobbled a bit as he came back into position breathing hard and looking over at the alien who was staring, frozen in place. "Sorry about that, it's a good replacement, but not perfect."

The doctor had its head tilted lightly to the side, "In what way?"

The captain rubbed the back of his neck, not sure if he would be able to explain, "That may be hard to explain. I can feel heat and cold and pressure just fine, but...but it’s like I can't always tell where it's oriented in space, especially the toes and the ankle. I can feel that my leg or foot is rotated, but not how far it's rotated. I can't explain any better than that. I'm not a scientist."

"How did you lose it?" the doctor inquired.

Vir raised an eyebrow, a bit surprised at the question, "A bit blunt aren't you? People usually wait a while before asking me that question, and, when they do, it's usually in a whisper, like they're worried they’ll surprise me with the news."

"I'm...sorry?"

The captain shrugged, "Don't be, it's refreshing. I lost my leg in the Drev war."

The doctor was surprised, "The Drev war, I knew humans participated, but I never thought..."

"We were in the thick of it. From what I have learned, the Drev war practices are personally aggressive. Humans have spent thousands of years trying to develop technology that will kill the most people from the farthest distance. We try to sterilize war, remove ourselves from the horror. For the Drev, warfare is...it’s close combat.” His chest was tightening up “Their methods include ripping off limbs to…gain an advantage." He felt like he was being crushed. He closed his eyes. He just had to remember what the doctor had taught him.

Just breathe.

He heard the little creature move forward, "Captain...are you...having a medical emergency?"

Eyes still closed, he took a shaky breath, "No...I'm ok, it’s just not something that is easy to talk about."

He took a few more deep breaths before opening his eyes and smiling, he straightened back up as his heart rate went back down. “On a lighter note, I welcome you to the mess hall." Quite aware of just how dramatic he was being, and totally on purpose, the captain pushed the doors open to the mess-hall.

Not that there was anything impressive about the cafeteria, but it did seem to have an effect on the little alien who, after a moment of looking, was forced to turn away. The captain wasn’t sure what that reaction was all about. Maybe this alien liked eating alone. He knew the doctor would have a lot of new things to get used to, so maybe this was just overwhelming.

Leaving the little alien standing dumbstruck behind him, the captain strode towards the nearest table barely breaking stride as he took a step up onto a chair, and then onto the table itself. The occupants of this particular table leaned back to look up at him, though they hardly seemed as surprised as they should have been.

"Good Morning, Captain,"

He looked down at the dark haired soldier, "Good morning, Jackie, glad to see you're doing well."

She tilted her head, "Are you wearing an eyepatch?"

He tilted his head from side to side so they could get a better view, "I am, do you like it?"

"I mean ... yeah it's pretty cool but,” she leaned in a bit closer, “what about your eye?"

"About that, I may have...lost it. I didn’t really lose it as, how can one lose an eye, but rather is was deemed unable to repair and so it was tossed."

She blinked in confusion, and he didn’t give her time to recover as he turned towards the rest of the crew, "HEY MISCREANTS, YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE!"

They obeyed almost instantly, the murmuring died to a few quiet whispers on the fringes of the crowd, "I have a few announcements upon the event of my glorious return!"

There were a few snickers from the crowd.

"First of all, I am glad to report that I survived, though I cannot take credit for that."

More chuckling.

"Secondly, yes this is an eyepatch, and yes, that does mean I am now a cyclops. But fear not, I am now the recipient of at least one hundred more awesome points because nothing is more badass than an eyepatch which; fun fact, is totally the only reason that pirates wore them. It’s true, absolutely no other reason - none whatsoever."

Now that he had warmed them up, it was time to see how they were going to take the next bit of news. "Our third order of business, I procured a distinguished and brilliant medical officer."

That stirred some conversation in the crowd, and they all craned their necks to see the new physician. Captain Vir turned and motioned Krill forward, "Well, come on doctor, don't be shy."

The doctor approached the table, but stopped there glaring.

The captain called it a glare, but until he got more familiar with his new alien doctor, he was actually just guessing when it came to his expressions.

"Don't give me that look doctor; I know you can float. Come on, get up here."

Eventually the doctor did as requested, though the captain was getting the distinct impression of radiating annoyance, which morphed quickly into radiating fear, and Captain Vir found himself gently holding the little creature from floating away.

"Alright, ALRIGHT! Sit your asses down, and quiet so I don't have to raise my voice, good. Everyone, this is Dr. Krill, and by his own accounts he is the galaxy's preeminent trauma surgeon, and a passable doctor for humans as shown by my recovery. And because of our new and most prestigious crewmember, I thought this would be a great time to review our safety regulations as you yahoos need frequent reminders."

A whispered comment from the side caught his attention "Most of those rules are because of the captain."

He turned his eyes toward the source of the remark, putting on a voice of mock indignation, "Hey, I resemble that remark. Besides,” he held out his hands, “you see me paying attention don't you, riveted by my own glorious list of safety protocols."

Vir turned back to the larger audience, "Ok kids, let's hear it; rule number one."

There was a general mumbling about the room.

"Oh come on, I can't hear you!"

"AYE AYE, CAPTAIN!"

This time, the laughter went beyond mere snickering.

He barked a laugh, "Ok, that was - that was actually pretty funny. Now stop being insolent and answer the question.”

He raised his hands conducting them like children as they chanted, "No chucking marshmallows at neutron stars."

He clapped his hands together, "Ah there it is and why, children, do we not chuck marshmallows at neutron stars?"

"Dropped from a distance of 1 AU a single marshmallow can cause an explosion equal to that of three-megaton nuclear warhead," they droned in unison.

He held up a hand to quiet the whispering, "Good work, but all joking aside, let’s get serious."

He took a deep breath and stood up straighter, his voice lowering slightly.

"Number one; as per the UNSC safety regulations manual, food and drink are absolutely prohibited near the warp core. Second; and I cannot stress this enough, sexual harassment, assault, discrimination or anything like unto it will not be tolerated. Anyone male or female who initiates, participates in or condones in any way, shape or form any such behavior will be immediately dismissed from duty and, by UNSC bylaw, will be dishonorably discharged and sentenced according to the severity of the punishable offense. Third; open flames are prohibited on the bridge, near the warp core, or the reactor core. I'm dead serious about this one guys. I don't feel like dying because you thought it might be a good idea to roast a marshmallow near the warp core. Please see the UNSC safety manual for any and all other issues or concerns you may have."

He took a deep breath and smiled reverting back to his normal self. "As far as my personal ship rules, buckle up because it is a much longer list. Driver picks the music, and since I'm the Captain, I pick the music. Although, I do accept bribes for requests. Don't eat food that isn't yours. The UNSC manual states that romantic relationships between crewmembers are prohibited, but I'm going to say right now that if I don't find out then it didn't happen. Don't get pregnant, don't get anyone pregnant, this counts doubly for shore leave. If you are arrested, fined or kidnapped, all bail, parking tickets, ransoms or debts will be paid out of your monthly wages." He smiled slightly as he saw a few exchanged looks between the crewmembers.

"Playing golf, frisbee, badminton, football, baseball, hockey or any other game or sport out of the airlock is prohibited. The space suits are not for your entertainment. And this rule is only here for your safety.... and mine.... mostly mine," he waved a hand and continued, "do not play with the artificial gravity modulating systems. I know you want to see how high you can jump at half your weight, or float around trying to drink water droplets, but this causes problems for the rest of the crew, and please for the love of Jupiter, don't ask me for an exception because I will probably agree, and we will all definitely regret it. All wheeled systems of transport are prohibited in the cargo bay during flight. All drinks on the bridge must be in closed containers. Excessively loud mouth noises are prohibited. Wash your hands. Don't pick up alien substances of unknown origin and certainly don't put in your mouth. Showers are and will be mandatory, no exceptions. I reserve the right to terminate your employment on my ship if your smell offends my sensibilities."

He turned to look at the doctor, “Did you get all that?”

Despite his inability to blink, the captain sensed a slow blink of confusion, "There were complete sentences I did not understand, and what exactly is a marshmallow?"

He let a wicked smile cross his lips, "That's alright, you don't strike me as a delinquent and it would be my pleasure to introduce you to the marshmallow." With that he turned back to his crew "Thank you for your attention, you may return to your victuals," he concluded before leaping down from the table and striding out of the room dragging the doctor with him.

Was he dramatic? Yes

Did he care? No


	9. Chapter 9

Human bone is five times stronger than steel of the same proportions and more flexible, which accounts for a human's surprising durability despite their comparative lack of internal protection to other species. 

A hot, arid wind blew across the blue dunes. A small cloud of the sapphire dust enveloped her face, and Challan was forced to lower her head against the grainy little specks that bit into her skin. Overhead the greenish yellow sky was awash with yellow clouds blotting out the sun and washing the desert in darkness.

She pulled her cloak around her shoulders shielding the breathing holes at her neck. It wasn’t an action that she needed to take as she was used to the thick billowing ash of the dark season; however, just because she could tolerate it didn’t mean she had to.

She lifted her head to the sky.

“Is it going to rain?” She questioned as she glanced around at the wide desert of blue sand, imagining rivulets of blue sludge miring them in the squishy blue sludge.

Felix, the Tesraki, laughed, “No, it hasn’t rained on the equator in over a squillion cycles. And you better be glad it won’t.” He motioned to their two large steeds who were dragging the sleds across the fine sand. They had only two legs, no tails, and long necks leading to slight heads encompassing two round, bulging eyes. Their backsides hung low as if there had once been a tail there but it had long since fallen off. A large frill ran down the length of their backs.

“The Drakondi have a bad reaction to water, just like the Rundi. If it were to rain they would die, and we would follow soon after.”

Chalan stared incredulously, “Everything needs water to live.”

The Tesraki shrugged, “Not the Rundi, something to do with a need for different basic life elements. I can’t remember which ones though. I’m not a scientist.”

He rocked back on his cart as another gust of wind kicked up around them. Chalan glanced towards the rest of the caravan, being pulled by similar beasts.

“Why don’t you use those hover engines?”

The Tesraki’s ears twitched and he waved her off, “Like I have enough money for that. Besides, there is something about the desert I enjoy; the silence, the wide open spaces, and the heat.”

“And the wind spitting sand in your face.’

He gurgled slightly in the back of his throat while brushing accumulated dust from the thick fur on his chest, “That too.”

She glanced around, “We do not have deserts on my planet.”

The Tesraki’s ears twitched, “No deserts! What do you have?”

“Volcanoes mostly, and moss covered moors. I have heard stories about large lakes of water in the south and dormant volcanoes in the north, but I have never seen those places.”

Felix snorted, scratching behind one of his ears, “I have no idea what my home-world is supposed to look like.”

Chalan turned to look at the old merchant with a confused expression, “How is that possible?”

“Because the Tesraki home world was industrialized long before my time. Hardly anyone remember what it looked like before the Great Speculation.”

“Industrialized?”

“Yes, buildings, power plants, machines and factories covering the land.”

Chalan tapped the shaft of her spear against her palm, “Technology to a great extent is heresy on Anin.”

The Tesraki stared at her in disbelief, “You are mocking me!”

“Technology for the use of war is considered heretical, but no one can agree on what is and is not part of war. Is infrastructure part of war? Is weather surveillance part of war? Is long distance communication part of war? All of these things can be used to aid in a war effort, so the traditionalists,” she looked down at her hands, “like my mother, consider all technology to be heresy, while others only believe it is when in direct application while fighting.”

The Tesraki leaned back against his crates, ‘Next you will be telling me that you live in a grass hut.”

“It was a stone hut, actually.”

He looked over at her, his large ears pulled back against his skull, “You are strange creatures aren’t you.” He adjusted his tail to a more comfortable position, “Tell me, why is technology so heretical? Wars could be won faster with technology?”

“That’s the problem. Once you add technology to war it is no longer about skill, prowess or intimacy. It is about cleverness, separation and sterility. The fight is not personal and there is no honor in that.”

“I can see the logic, However, I cannot see the logic in a Drev being so far from home.”

She lifted her head to look up at the thickening cloud cover, “I am looking for someone.”

“A single being in an entire universe. That seems like a tall order.’

She sighed and looked down at the shaft of her spear, which glowed with the yellow reflection of the sky above, “I am beginning to understand that.”

“Who is it that you are looking for?”

She paused, not entirely sure she should tell him, but then it occurred to her that there was nothing he could do or glean from the information even if he did know. He was a simple merchant.

“I am looking for a human I met during the war.”

The Tesraki sat up with great interest, “A human!”

She nodded.

“You are just getting more and more interesting by the moment, now aren’t you?” He smirked, leaning back again.

“Have you ever met a human?” She wondered

He shook his head, the scarf about his neck and shoulders whipping in the wind. More sand particulates billowed up from the ground and stung her skin as she watched him, “Met one, no; but I did see one once.”

She blinked, “Really, where?”

“It was at the market in Iranboo a month or so back.”

“What was it doing?”

“Lying in a cage. It could have been dead for all I know. Creepy looking things.”

A cage, that surprised her. From what she knew of humans – from what she had seen of them – she doubted they would be easily caged. A shiver ran up her spine, and she blinked back the image of a bloody red sky, billowing ash, and orange blood painting the rocks in great expanding pools.

Ahead of her the animals gave off a short sort of churring noise pulling in agitation against their harnesses, “Why was it in a cage?”

Felix pulled back on the reins growling at the creatures to relax before turning to look at her, “It was being sold, of course.”

“Sold!” Why? For what? She had never heard of a living creature being sold before.

“You seem surprised. The universe has a rather large interplanetary slave market, though the GA would like us all to believe it doesn’t exist.”

“Slaves?”

He gave her that same familiar expression of incredulity, “You don’t know what slaves are either? On your planet don’t they take prisoners during war? And don’t you force those prisoners to serve you?”

Chalan vigorously shook her head in disgust.

“I’ll say it again; you are a strange species. In the galaxy, there are certain creatures, trades or industries that don’t want to do their own work, or don’t want to pay workers, so they skyjack or buy beings and then force them into a life of servitude and bondage.”

Chalan shook her head incredulously, “Drev would die before becoming slaves.”

“Probably why you don’t practice it. What happens when you conquer another clan?”

“If we take their temple, then they are conquered. The victors either driven them out, or they join the victorious clan in order to learn from the greater warriors.”

“So you integrate them into your clan.”

“Of course, if they are still alive, they were tremendous fighters so you would capitalize on that triumph.”

Felix seem to accept her explanation. Ahead of them the animals pulling the caravan grumbled again bumping into each other and clicking in agitation.

“Knock it off!” Felix snarled, dragging against the reins again.

“Do they often take humans as slaves?”

Felix covered his eyes against another gust of wind, “Not many humans in the galaxy to sell. I only learned about them about five cycles ago and the war ended only last cycle.”

Chalan had to steady herself against the edge of the sled as the creatures began pulling them up the side of a dune.

Felix glanced back at his cargo. “I might know the planet that would sell them. The tag on the crate read A136.”

The runners rocked and bounced, and Chalan nearly fell off the cart, forced to ram her spear into the side to keep herself straight. Felix glowered at her, “Hey, watch the paint.”

“Sorry,” she muttered, “I’ve never heard of A136.”

His ears twitched, “It’s a laboratory planet run by the Rundi. A1 signifies it’s rating on the planetary habitation scale. A1 is classified as a death planet, though still habitable enough to walk on the surface.”

“What’s so wrong with it that it would have to be called a death planet?”

“Well, the whole damn thing lights on fire when the sun comes out, but apparently the plant life is into that kind of thing. As the sun rotates over the land the plants catch on fire from the sun’s heat and the convection currents of the air bring cold air from the dark side of the planet when it finally rotates back around. Hot air and cold air mix creating massive rainstorms that cool off the plants before they regenerate during the night.”

They were approaching the crest of the hill, “That is amazing.” Chalan muttered.”

“Isn’t it?”

Ahead of them the creatures made one last surge towards the top of the hill, and the runners evened out. Felix looked behind them to make sure the rest of his haul was following in a similar manner.

He glanced over to where Chalan was rolling the spear through her hands, “So, that spear of yours, does it have anything to do with this human you are trying to find?”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you intend to stick a human through the throat with it? A quest for revenge, payment for wrongs done.”

The runners of their sled slipped with the decline, threatening to slide right into the beasts of burden. However, the Tesraki stretched out, stopping that scenario with firm pressure on a lever at his feet, causing a trowel to drop from the back of the cart and dig into the sand.

A billow of azure dust puffed up behind them.

“Why would you think that?” she wondered as the Tesraki blinked back a face-full of dust.

“You said you met this human in the war. Humans and Drev were on opposite sides of the war, so I assume maybe he had killed a family member of yours, and that you are venturing into the galaxy to find him and take your final revenge, or some sort of nonsense.”

She looked down at her hands and remained quiet.

He grunted, “Fine, don’t tell me, though maybe you can answer a question.”

She spun the spear between her hands.

“Maybe.”

“I’m unclear on how or why the war started, that’s all. I know that a Bran mining cruiser had been harvesting from one of your moons, some representatives of the GA were violently murdered and that somehow escalated into full out war, but the details are a mystery.”

Chalan stared at the Tesraki, “You don’t know about the war?”

He shrugged, “Big universe.”

He turned back to his cart and to the sky leaving Chalan to simply sit and marvel at just how small her world had been. Before now, she had barely ventured more than twenty miles from her village, and even after that, she had never ventured outside the fertile belt. The war had been the biggest thing in her life, the defining moment of her entire existence, and here was this strange furry alien, from a hot planet covered in sand who barely knew anything about it.

“Most of that is correct.” She was still having trouble wrapping her head around his ignorance concerning the war as she formulated her response, “A tribe just to the south of my home called the ‘Hidden Tribe’ were not so averse to technology as the rest of the clans. They were aware of the large deposits of metal on our moons, and knew that with access to metal they would have greater access to weaponry.”

The Tesraki slapped his tail against the sled, “They went to the moon for metal!” A derisive snort kicked up a cloud of dust around his head, “They wanted metal, so they went to the moon.” Chalan narrowed her eyes at the Tesraki as he continued his mocking, “I may not be the greatest businessman in the world, but any Tesraki child could tell you that that is an unsustainable business model.”

She tapped her spear against the sledge in annoyance.

He snorted again but waved her on, “It is a sacrilege to mine the surface of Anin. The point is they met an alien species when they landed.”

“And so they slaughtered the whole lot of them right there and started a war!” He slapped his tail against the sled again with enthusiasm this time as if mass murder was of great amusement to him.

“No they did not, at least not right away.”

Chalan sighed feeling little grains of sand tickling at the edge of her breathing holes, “My people did not handle things well. Their Sentinel—the leader of their clan—called a council of all the major tribes of the fertile belt to decide what was to be done about the trespassers.”

“So some egomaniacal despot convinced them to take action.”

She shrugged her wide armored shoulders, “Yes. I was not allowed in on the council meetings but from what I have learned, their Sentinel preyed upon the clans’ fears and apprehensions. He convinced them that they needed to destroy the interlopers before they invaded our home world. We learned later, he secretly wanted to obtain the alien technology for his clan. He never imagined this new contact was only the first of many alien species and that they were not a warring species. We judged them by our own beliefs.”

They began another trek up another short rise, “The Rundi have never made war in their recorded history. Neither have the Bran, and when it comes to us Tesraki, we prefer to do war on the field of economics rather than the field of battle.”

She didn’t entirely understand what he meant with that last bit so she continued, “The elders could not conceive of another way of thinking. Despite a few voices of reason, they determined the only way to protect ourselves was to initiate a preemptive strike against the intruders.”

The Tesraki shook his head sadly.

“That is when they hijacked a GA ship and killed all the delegates on board, sending a threatening message to stay away from Anin. It was also their intention to bring the ship back to Anin and use their technology to better protect ourselves.’

“And how did that work out for you?”

“It was going fine at first”

“You are aware that the GA could have just destroyed your planet from the beginning.”

Chalan winced; she didn’t like to think about that, though she nodded her head, “We do now, but at the time, we had no conception of the power of the GA or the sheer number of alien species associated. The GA tried to initiate peace talks but our elders pressed on.”

“Can’t puzzle that out.”

She shook her head again, “We are a warrior species. Our council was sure that we could compete with them in war, and we did for a while. You Rundi and Tesraki are not so durable.”

The Tesraki chirped darkly, “Annihilated us did you?”

“Yes.”

The next gust of wind that kicked up was so violent it nearly tore the cloak from Chalan’s shoulders. The cart rocked violently, and she had to fight against the gust just to stay upright.

The little Tesraki faring even worse, and once she righted herself she reached out to grab and steady him as the wind slowly died.

He adjusted his scarf, “Thanks, so I am assuming this is when the humans showed up?”

“Yes.”

“And they annihilated you?”

“Yes,” she reached out brushing her hand over a small pile of sand that had accumulated on the seat of the sledge, “It quickly became evident that the humans were as war-like as we were, though their methods could not have been more different.”

“How is that?”

“When humans make war, they do it to kill as effectively as possible. It is not about skill, or honor, it is all about getting rid of your enemy by any means necessary.”

With a grunt the Tesraki nodded, “A good business model, that.”

“The humans fought from a distance where we only fought up close. They had weapons that could kill us from great distances, where we couldn’t see them. They had devices that would cause explosions. I even saw machines flew overhead and sounded like thunder.”

“It all sounds very impressive when you say it like that, but I am more than a little confused as to why the war lasted so long.”

Chalan closed her eyes remembering the sound of that strange flying machine is it screamed overhead; how the machine had completely annihilated an entire platoon of their soldiers.

“The dark season.”

“Dark season?”

“Yes, during the dark season volcanic activity increases sending ash into the sky. The ash is so thick it blots out the sun and leaves the land dark.”

The Tesraki tilted his head staring off into the distance as if trying to imagine the scene she had painted for him, “I imagine you didn’t see any of their flying machines during this time.”

She nodded, “No, their air technology cannot work if the engine is sucking in ash.” The thought gave her some small measure of amusement, “The dark season gave us an advantage. Their long range weapons did not work, their flying machines did not work, their long range communications did not work, and they were running low on supplies. We used that time to strike.”

“How good are humans at close combat?” The sky was darkening in the distance, and all around them the beasts were beginning to kick up a fuss. The Tesraki clicked sharply with his tongue and the creatures quieted down, though they continued to toss their heads.

“It depended on the human. They are not all trained from birth like the Drev. Some of them were strong enough, fast enough, or smart enough to beat us, but the vast majority of them were not that skilled. However, humans are strangely difficult to kill.”

“I have heard similar stories.”

Sunny watched the light run up and down the length of her spear as she continued her story, “In Drev culture, to be crippled in battle or unable to fight is as good as a kill.

He glanced over at her one ear cocked upward head tilted. She tried to ignore him, “Generally we did not bother to kill them completely, but removed their limbs and left them to expire in the ash.”

She was well aware of him suddenly scooting in the opposite direction of her, but she didn’t bother to point it out, “After months of this we had taken their encampments, killed or maimed their men, and now they were hemmed in and running out of food.”

The Tesraki stood up slightly in his seat trying to get a better look at the horizon though a line of dunes was in their way, “how did you managed to fowl that up?”

“We didn’t.”

“Then what went wrong.”

“The humans sent their wounded men back into battle.”

In the back of her mind, she could hear the slow hydraulic hiss as dark shapes moved through smoke under a blood red sky. She recalled the sharp report of the human’s weapons and the flashes of light from billowing clouds of ash.

“How the hell did they do that?”

“Simple, the came back with new appendages.”

The animals grunted in surprise as the Tesraki hauled back suddenly on the reins. The sled and the animals together came skidding to a violent halt as the Tesraki looked at her, his eyes narrowed, “They what!”

“They sent their wounded men back onto the battlefield…except…they weren’t wounded anymore.”

“How do you become un-wounded from missing limbs?”

“They replaced their missing limbs with technology, applied machinery.”

That had the Tesraki scoffing again waving his hands about and exclaiming in disbelief, “Replacing their limbs with machines; unbelievable but extraordinary!”

“They were wearing exoskeletal, technological suits which made them made them stronger and faster, and within two days, the Drev army had surrendered.”

The Tesraki was astonished at this revelation, “Two days?”

“Yes, two days.”

“How many did you lose?” His voice had gone quiet, which surprised her enough to look over. He hadn’t struck her as a creature that tended towards the empathetic, but she found that he was looking at her through somewhat softened eyes.

“I do not know the numbers, but there were many.”

“I’m sorry.”

She waved him off, “There is no need for sorrow. They died an honorable death against an honorable foe.” He pulled his ears back, eyes pausing on her face with a furrowed brow. She brushed some sand from her neck, “It is not personal.”

He tapped his fingers against the seat of the sledge, “I am, confused. You aren’t mad at the humans, but they beat you with technology, so doesn’t that mean that they did not do it honorably.”

The desert around them was quiet except for the slow swish of their runners over the sand, “It’s complicated.”

“Try me.”

“Their original tactics were not honorable in our eyes, but then they sent crippled humans out to beat us, and that upended our entire understanding of our culture.”

He tilted his head urging her to continue with a nod, “Their maimed and mutilated humans returned to battle stronger than before. Any creature who can do that deserves honor.”

He looked up at the sky, “I see the sense in that.”

She tapped her fingers against the spear, “You don’t sound convinced.”

“Well, I am a Tesraki, we don’t understand war.”

“I saw plenty of you people during the war.”

He snorted, “Yeah, you saw the poor sods who aren’t economically savvy enough to keep themselves afloat without hiring themselves out for work.” He flattened his ears, “Of course, there are a few of those do-gooders out there, who actually believe in helping the GA because it benefits the continuation of our society or some refuse like that…”

She rumbled deep in her chest with mild amusement, “You aren’t an idealist? Why am I not surprised?”

“Idealism is for children, and people who don’t love money; which I do, like most Tesraki do.”

“Why?”

He waved a hand, “War is as much a part of your culture, as money is a part of mine. Tesraki history is built on the currency and economy.”

“We do not have money on my planet. If you are hungry, you pick some fruit. If you want to survive through the dark season, you pick a lot of fruit. If you need something you don’t have, you trade for it.”

“I know what a trade market is, and I also know that it doesn’t work with many participants and complex goods.” He sat up a little straighter, and snapped the leads to his animals with a sharp crack, “Well get moving! We don’t have time for your meandering!”

Chalan looked up glancing over at the animals who osculated back and forth with nervous agitation. There was a lot of movement, though not much of that movement happened to be in a forward direction.

The wind had picked up again whipping at her face, and tugging at her cloak until there was an almost roaring in her ears, “What’s wrong with them?”

Had everything suddenly gotten louder, like the distant roaring breath of a volcano?

“You’ll see, just over the next rise.”

Chalan craned her neck upwards.

The sky past the next dune was pretty dark, bluing towards night and as they crested the top of the rise the wind only grew more urgent, tugging at her clothes and face.

Off to her side, the Tesraki began to wrap his scarf around his head covering his nose and mouth so only his eyes were peering through a slit.

Chalan followed his lead. The wind grew so powerful that she was having trouble staying in place, and the animals pulling the sledge were almost pressed back down the dune. The very top of the hill seemed to be steadily shrinking as great gusts of air dragged dust from the very peak and straight into their faces. Chalan raised a hand as they came over the rise, and was suddenly hit by another gust of wind so powerful she was almost thrown back into the cart.

The Tesraki had wedged his feet down against the sides of the cart to keep himself in place.

Chalan squinted past the wind peering through her fingers only two be immediately awestruck by the sight before her.

An absolutely massive cloud of dust had arisen over the desert and –even as she watched—great blue tentacles seemed to billow out from the cloud plunging down to draw the land towards itself like the greedy clutches of a hungry predator. Land was consumed before them in great swaths as the sky overhead was clotted out.

The wind kicked again, and the sand –which had once been soft underfoot—pelted her skin like the hot stinging of volcanic sparks. She could barely lift her head as the wind roared in her ears.

The Tesraki clung to his reins as he led the creatures down into the valley. Overhead the massive cloud clawed closer. The closer it got, the harder the wind blew and a sense of urgency had fallen over them as the animals kicked and screamed in agitation.

“Help me get them in a circle!” The Tesraki called, fighting against the wind as he leaped down form the cart.

Chalan followed after him leaning against the wind as it tried to push her back across the sand, little particles leaping up to sting her legs and chest. It reminded her of the billowing cinderstorms on Anin, though much more violent, like the storm itself was driven by malicious and hateful intent. She reached the back cart and grabbed one of the creatures by the lead pulling it toward Felix who then took it by the lead and pulled it down into a tight circle with the sledges acting like barriers against the sand. Chalan struggled against the ever increasing wind, desperate to reach the last cart and drag it back to Felix. He beckoned her closer as a large puff of sapphire sand turned black and menacing. He yelled something at her, but over the screaming of the wind, she could hear nothing.

She struggled the last two feet to where he was standing. The cloud billowed at his back as a massive towering wall that reached miles into the sky. He grabbed the creature, cramming himself up against her leg as he dragged it into a sitting position. Then with Chalan’s help he dragged an oilcloth overhead, pinning it under the runners of some of the sledges.

Chalan couldn’t have imagined the wind getting any stronger, but it seemed as if she was building up a trend of being proven wrong. Not seconds after they pulled the tarp into place, the storm hit. She strained and clutched and barely managed to hold it in place as the wind battered against them. Every so often it seemed as if the wind would let up, but then they would be bludgeoned with another gust of sand which scraped against their tarp with a power to match an awaking volcano.

Her entire body was tense and sore from fighting the wind.

Beside her, the Tesraki had curled himself into a ball, scarf covering his face.

Chalan had been in many battles and in many situations in which she should not have survived, but for the first time in her life—isolated on a desert planet so far from home—she was afraid.

Afraid of dying before her mission really began.


	10. Chapter 10

Dr. Krill struggled valiantly to keep up with the human's impossibly long strides. From his vantage point, behind and slightly to the side of the human, he watched in great fascination the rolling lines of muscle flexing throughout the human body making him very aware of his own disjointed scuttling in comparison.

His fluidity shouldn't have been possible, considering his center of gravity was just below the chest making him top heavy, and mechanically likely to fall flat on his face with all the grace and poise of a rockslide. However, observing the human with a more scientific eye, he could see how the entire body worked to balance itself, from the tendons of the feet to the swinging pendulum of the arms. He was so focused on his observation that he nearly concussed himself on an exposed pipe as they rounded a corner.

Hearing him falter, the human turned to look, "You should probably avoid braining yourself on the first day of work, you see I got this new doctor, and he's a bit of a novice when it comes to neurosurgery. I wouldn't trust him."

Krill stared at the human in puzzlement trying to piece together the facial expression that cross the human’s face: one of the fuzzy lines above his eye raised, the mouth pulled tight tilted upwards at one corner, a slight rotation of the head, "Wait, Human, I thought you just said I was the new doctor."

The human regarded him with one fuzzy line raised.

When the human finally spoke his voice was slower than normal, which confused Krill even more. "Yes, doctor, that was the point."

Krill stared blankly on, "I don't understand."

"I was kidding..... joking.... jesting.... messing with you.... utilizing verbal irony to make light of a situation."

When Krill simply continued to stare, the human rattled his head back and forth in ... frustration? "Honestly, doc, your planet is as comically dry as the Sahara Desert. What do you do for fun there, pull teeth?"

"We don't have teeth, and you said desert twice."

The expression the human made this time involved a slight parting of the lips, the tilting of the head and the scrunching of the muscles around the eyes, "Sahara..... right.” He turned and continued walking.

Krill struggled to catch up.

“Doc, if you are going to remain aboard this ship with humans, I think your first lesson is going to have to be on humor because my friend yours is severely lacking. It's honestly a crime against humanity."

Krill almost ran into another pipe.

"I don't mean like a real crime doc, and stop walking so close to the wall, you're making me nervous. Lesson number one for living with humans is the use of irony or humor."

"What is this word…irony…it does not translate."

The human hummed deep in his chest rubbing slowly at the back of his neck, "There are different kinds of irony, but the most important one is verbal. Verbal irony is when you say one thing but mean something else."

Krill looked at him incredulously, "Why would you do something like that? The confusion and misinterpretation in communication would lead to disorder and confusion."

The human waved a dismissive hand at him, "Cool your jets doc, most humans know when you're using irony. Let’s dissect my earlier joke. First, I talked about you as if you weren't you, and then I implied you were bad at brain surgery even though you aren't, since you performed mine, before finishing off by pointing out that you are the only doctor on this ship and probably wouldn't be able to help yourself if you were injured.... make sense?"

Krill had four cortical hemispheres which could operate independently of each other, was the highest ranked medical professional in the galaxy, spoke eight languages other than his own, and yet, here he stood, feeling like an absolute, massive imbecile.

Krill was not used to feeling unintelligent.

"You didn't understand a word I said, did you? So much for being a genius eh, doc."

"I'll have you know that-"

He was cut short as the human threw his hands into the air with a cry of frustration "I was teasing! Obviously I didn't mean it."

Krill paused, eyeing the human, "Was that more of your... irony?"

"Yes, now you're getting it."

"And your species actually completed peace talks with the GA?" Krill wondered incredulously.

A bright green eye fixed on him, "You know, I would have said that was funny if I didn't know you were serious."

"So it is only humorous if it's not serious or in jest?"

"No it can be serious, but either the intention has to be funny, or the people listening to it have to find it funny."

"What makes something funny?"

The human looked at him, opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again and then gave a frustrated growl. Krill found the noise deeply unsettling. "Something is funny if...you point out the absurdity of a situation. It's funny if... the situation is tense or you're afraid and you need to ease the tension. It's funny if it’s unbelievable, or unfortunate. It's funny if it's true, but abnormal or unusual. It's also funny if it's out of context. It's funny if it's unbelievably stupid, but not too stupid because sometimes stupid things can also be sad, but it can also be sad, funny and stupid at the same time."

"I'm sorry..... you actually communicate.... like this ... effectively?"

"I could give you examples and situations, but it would probably be best and easiest if you just observe for a while. Also, don't try it without adult supervision because if you don't know what you're doing or depending on the audience, it could go very, very wrong and then you're in a pile of shit before you know it,"

The Vrul didn't get headaches, but it was possible for his species to receive cortical overload. He was very close to cortical overload.

Together, the two of them came to a halt before a double-wide set of doors. The humans that walked by made no pretense when staring at Krill and the captain, but mostly Krill, and he could feel the panic rising inside him again. What had he gotten himself into?

The Captain elbowed a small square of metal beside the door, which depressed and caused the doors to open with a metallic hiss. The environment around them was enveloped in a glaring bright light, and a murmur of measured human voices. The captain motioned him forward through the doors which shut with a soft snick behind them.

The room or set of rooms that Krill had entered was clearly a product of greater effort than the rest of the ship. Like the bridge, there were no exposed pipes, no open metal, or dim fluorescent light from above. The walls and floors were covered with a light grey almost white surface.

The humans themselves were dressed to match their environment, most in light pastels though one wore dark blue, and ordered the others around with great authority.

Examining the room itself, well... it was a complete disaster. Practicing medicine here would be like practicing medicine during the second solar season of their planet's history when medical practice included one thing and one thing only: dying a horrible, excruciating death.

During Krill's examination, the human had wandered off, a fact Krill was alerted to when a voice boomed out across the room, "Keep your hands off my equipment!”

There was a sharp smacking noise, and Krill spun to find the human in the dark blue scrubs squared off with the captain, her hair was long and dark, her skin was lightly tanned, and her eyes were ringed with a delicate webbing of wrinkles where the skin had lost its elasticity.

The captain snatched back his hand with a yelp and a grin, "Good morning, doc."

"Good morning my ass, and don't call me doctor. I'm a PA, a physician's assistant. A physician's assistant without a physician to assist, mind. Do you know how many doctors this ship is supposed to have? TWO, the chief medical officer and the second attending physician. And you know how many PAs we are supposed to have? FOUR. We have not even one doctor, just a single PA and a crew full of rambunctious idiots, you being the biggest, most rambunctious idiot of them all!”

Krill stepped back against the strength of her anger, but the captain just continued to smile. "And I was just about to compliment you on the incredible job you have been doing."

"Stop kissing my ass, it isn't sanitary," she paused just then, “and what the hell is that on our face?"

"My nose?"

"Ha, ha you are adorable, I mean this," she jabbed a finger at the eye patch.

The captain shrugged, "A new wardrobe accessory, makes me look dashing, don't you think?"

"Makes you look like a dipshit," she pushed him back forcing him to sit on the edge of one of the beds. Ignoring his protests, she pulled off the patch and grabbed his face to examine the eye,

"Rmmmffff."

"This isn't even bandaged! What kind of hillbilly backwater hell hole facility did you go to?" The human's single remaining eye slanted sideways towards Krill.

"Well that's what I've been trying to tell you, I brought you a new attending physician. The best in the galaxy."

Krill was suddenly aware of an entire room of eyes on him, including the cold brown eyes of the PA.

"What kind of doctor doesn't know how to pack a wound, and where the hell is the replacement? You know the bone structure won't hold up without something in there."

Despite her alarming hostility, Krill felt a slight surge of anger at her questioning, "Watch your tone with me, human. I performed the surgery that removed the object, and if you look closer you will find that I used that time to shore up the orbital structure around the inside of the socket. Furthermore, if we are to be working together, I will require the proper respect that is due my station. If you have any issues, I am sure we can find a proper assignment for you; these floors could use a good sterilization."

The captain opened his mouth to speak, but the PA cut him off, "Is this bug just screwing with me, or is he really telling the truth?"

"He has absolutely no sense of humor, but he works a mean scalpel."

The PA remained quiet for a moment examining the man's wound, "The bug wasn't lying about his work. We wouldn't want to ruin that pretty face of yours." She patted him on the cheek rather aggressively before turning away to grab her equipment. The captain rubbed the side of his face.

"Ouch, has anyone ever told you, you need to work on your bedside manner?"

"Kid, the sick people I work with are military and the last thing they want is cuddles, now, tilt your head back." The captain did as ordered, and the PA turned her predatory eyes upon Krill, "Take a look around."

Krill didn’t need to, for he had already looked. It was all very primitive; the sterilization techniques were sub-par at best, and the operating suite was practically a torture chamber.

He returned just as the PA was finishing up, placing a white gauze pad over the opening, "How's that?"

"Itchy," the Captain responded, pulling on his eye patch to the chagrin of the PA. She was fighting a losing battle though and turned back to Krill.

He took it as an opportunity to speak, "An absolute disaster. I am impressed that your species has survived for so long using such rudimentary equipment and procedures. If I am to work here things will change to meet my specification, starting with the operating suite. I would require updated medical equipment then, and only then will I be able to operate comfortably."

It was just then he became aware of how very quiet the room had become. The humans stood in a large, loose semicircle staring at him with incredulity, and hostility. The captain was the only one who didn't seem concerned. He had scooted back on the hospital bed, hands behind his head with ankles crossed. He absently scratched below the eye patch, watching.

"Can I get you some popcorn, Captain?" The PA hissed, though her eyes never turned from Krill.

"No, I am here in a purely observational capacity," he punctuated his invitation by adjusting the pillow.

The PA didn't acknowledge him, instead walking forward crouching down to Krill's eye level. For a moment he was distracted by the feat of balance she performed, resting on only the balls of her feet. He was somewhat less distracted when she caught his gaze. The eyes themselves were unnaturally still. The pupils were wide black holes.

Her voice, was as sharp and cold as shattered glass, "You may be "God" on your planet, but here, in my medical bay, you are only as good as your actions, and so far I’ve only heard talking.”

He stayed silent.

"Good now watch and learn, and maybe you and I will manage to get along."

The intervening stillness was broken when the captain rolled off the bed and leaped to his feet. "Just realized that I neglected to introduce the two of you. Rita, this is Krill. Krill this is Rita. She's been on my crew since the beginning, a real trooper. Sh-"

"What do you want?" Rita demanded, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Why do you always have to assume that I want something when I compliment you?"

"Because you are either causing problems are you are about too."

The captain allowed his smile to drop a little, patting Krill on the back, “I am not looking for any favors, but it is time to train your new doctor. Technically you will oversee him until he can stand on his own two...er...four feet."

Rita sighed, shoulders slumping, eyes turning towards the sky.

"Very well," she said to the ceiling before turning to look down at Krill, sweeping her hand to motion around the room, "we can start now. Let’s acquainted with the equipment.” The captain stepped back and Krill was forced to follow the lead of the cantankerous human.

He was far more afraid of her than he was the captain, but at least she was more concise in her speech than the captain, and by the end of her tour he understood the use and function of almost everything in the room.

It was all so primitive.

For crying out loud, they were still using magnets and radiation to see inside the body.

"That is, essentially, all the equipment we use on a regular basis. However, there are a few other things…" Krill stopped paying attention for a moment as his curiosity peaked when he caught a glimpse into a small side room.

There were two white basins: one closer to the floor and full of water and another one in the center of a counter with a mirror suspended on the wall over it. There was also a biohazard bin between the two and in the far corner, there was a small area sectioned off by a glass partition. A strange flexible metal tube hung on a peg next to the wall.

"And what is this equipment?" he asked looking up at the Captain, who stood the closest.

The captain turned to look back into the room and immediately his hand moved to the back of his neck. Krill was then surprised a second later as the human's skin changed color. It was so unexpected that he took a step back. He wasn't aware that humans had the ability to change their skin tone. Granted, it was a very subtle thing, the translucent white of his skin suddenly flooded with a reddish undertone.

He worried that it was some sort of warning signal.

The Captain crossed one hand over his body and continued to rub the base of his neck. These actions displayed a sense of unease or apprehension though it seemed to be for no reason.

"Er...uh.... you know what..." he looked towards Rita, "I just remembered all the captainy stuff I have to do, like captaining, and being the captain, so," he scooted past Krill and out onto the floor, "I give you the honor of explaining this room and its equipment to our new friend."

He moved towards the door and Rita sighed, "Coward," she mocked.

The human peered back around the door, his body already in the hallway, "Yes, yes I am."

He made another strange motion with a single hand snapping sharply away from his temple.

"Have fun kids," and then he disappeared into the hallway.

Krill looked over at Rita who was glaring after the captain, "I was unaware humans could change color."

Rita tilted her head brows furrowed, "What? No, we can't."

Krill looked back at her with a confusion which matched her own, "Yes, you do. I just saw it. He turned red or rather the epidermis on the Captain’s face and neck turned red."

Rita paused, the corners of her mouth turned down lips drawing together, the skin over her cheeks growing tight. "We cannot change color. What you saw was as a result an increase in to the face and neck. It can happen when someone becomes embarrassed."

"Embarrassed?”

"Yes."

He stared at her blankly, "I do not understand this word. It does not translate."

Rita stared at him, "Your species doesn’t get embarrassed?"

"I would think that my sudden confusion would make that relatively evident."

The human just stared at him, "Kinda hard to believe, doc. Everyone knows what embarrassment is."

Krill remained silent.

"Embarrassment is when you do something socially unacceptable, uncomfortable or ridiculous; like when you say or do something inappropriate around people or you see someone else say or do something socially inappropriate. Some humans have a physical manifestation of that feeling. They’re sympathetic nervous system floods the skin with blood."

Krill understood now, "Ah, that is why I do not understand. My species does not possess the social rules that your species does. Our social structure is based on survival, proliferation and advancement, not sociability." Krill glanced towards the side room, "What social rule did he break?"

The corner of Rita's mouth twitched, "It wasn't him; it was you."

Krill tilted his head "How interesting. What did I do?"

"You asked about something that is going to be very awkward to explain," she sighed.

"Awkward?"

Rita groaned but plunged on as she was not one to shy away from hard things, "Awkward is similar to embarrassment if not the same in most situations. You have asked a question that is going to be very uncomfortable because socially it is not appropriate to talk about with a stranger."

Now this was getting fascinating "You are already embarrassed about something I might do or say? Please remember, I am a physician and a Vrul so do not be embarrassed on my account.”

Rita began, "What do you consume for life and what are the waste products as a result?"

"Sunlight and carbon, the byproduct is of course oxygen. I suppose the shedding of outer layer dermal cells count as well."

Rita leaned back against a table arms crossed over her chest, "A plant then. Humans are animals, consumers. We can and must eat a few things: plants, their byproducts, or other animals. However, only a portion of that substance can be absorbed into and utilized by the body, so that which cannot be used and toxins produced by the body during that intervening time must be expelled: waste disposal."

Krill had to think about that for a moment, "Ah, yes of course. I was aware of that. I have had Tesraki patients before."

"Good," she relaxed.

“I don’t see why you were so apprehensive about the question and subsequent explanantion.”

She clasped her hands together, “You will forgive us for desiring our privacy.”

"Your privacy?" Krill cut in in confusion.

Rita struggle for a moment, but was assisted by another human, "We tend to place great emphasis on the wearing of clothing. The height of trust, is to allow someone to see you without any on, which is not only physically vulnerable but emotionally as well. In fact, we have a saying for this, 'catching someone with their trousers down' which just means catching someone at their most vulnerable. So it is extremely inappropriate to walk in on someone during a time of waste expulsion when we are half clothed."

The human didn't seem particularly embarrassed by the conversation, otherwise he wouldn't be smiling so much.

"Well said Jim," Rita finished, "but there is one more point that may be the most important. The process, while necessary, is actually pretty disgusting, and in this case it is also a biohazard concern. Human internal organs have more bacteria in them than there are individual cells on the human body."

That made Krill step back in shock and horror, suddenly glad that as a plant he was not generally susceptible to animal disease

"They don't hurt us, but help us digest food. However, once outside the body, they are not meant to come in contact with the mouth. What you see in that room is our process for removing the waste and destroying bacteria. The waste is disposed of and then hands are washed to avoid the spread of germs."

"That is rather disgusting," Krill added.

"Disgusting is an apt word and so now I hope you are beginning to understand why we have separate, private rooms for this, although I am sure that many of our orderlies will allow you to relieve them of bedpan duty if you truly want to witness waste removal," Rita half 'smiled' with many onlookers following suit.

"Do I even want to know what the thing in the corner is for?"

Rita glanced inside, "Ah, actually that's fine. Follow me." She walked him into the room, which he, for some reason, now found oddly uncomfortable. He eyed the oval basin a few feet to his right like it was going to come to life and spew infectious material all over him. Some of the humans who had left earlier returned to peer through the door, watching as Rita reached inside the glass container and turned a knob. Above them there was a sharp hiss and water began falling from the nozzle and onto the floor draining back into the interior of the ship, "This is meant used for to remove dirt, dead dermal cells, or other contaminants from our skin. It is called a shower. Human skin produces oil to avoid cracking. Bacteria also grows on the skin and both must be washed away for hygiene purposes which is done using water and chemical compounds."

Krill started, "How often are these things preformed?"

Rita shrugged, “The shower is generally used once a day but it depends on activity level and activities performed. Waste disposal depends on a great many things. You will become intimately acquainted with each as we often clean our patients and take waste samples to analyze bacterial presence in order to treat or diagnose."

She turned off the water, shook off her hand and walked from the room closing the door behind them. Krill saw the humans differently now. They were just squishy sacks of bio hazardous material encased in a thin dermal layer. He didn’t like thinking about humans being bulging sacks of disease, so he changed the subject.

"How many sexes does your species have?" He knew of two, but he was aware of certain animal species that could have up to four.

Rita took a seat, "Two to put it simply, but there are exceptions. Is this different in aliens?”

Krill looked at her in amusement, "Generally two is common, but three has been known to occur and four is theoretically plausible in certain smaller species. My species has only one sex."

He paused as Rita stared at him with wide eyes, "Only one?" she seemed surprised, "as in you are both male and female?"

Krill simply smiled, "No, I am neither male nor female for neither of them exist on my planet. I am capable of both producing and fertilizing eggs, though the production of eggs is a longer process that requires more time and conviction, so I have never personally chosen to produce eggs."

"What should I call you? I assumed he, but I guess that isn't quite accurate?"

"It does not matter with my species; however, for conformity I have taken the title of he."

The once annoyed and cantankerous human now looked at him with some measure of interest, her anger having been taken over by curiosity. "How very interesting," she muttered. "So, you can mate with anyone?"

"Theoretically I can, but I would never do that," he said vigorously shaking his head at her. The audacity of the thought incomprehensible.

Her head tilted the other way, a manifestation of curiosity that seemed common among humans, "May I ask why not?"

Krill looked at the poor naive human and shook his head, "There is a difference between can and should of course. For instance, I would never waste my genetic material on a delta, it just wouldn't be proper or useful with the proliferation of my species."

"A delta?" the human wondered.

"Of course you are ignorant of my species, so I will explain." Even more humans had gathered around to hear him speak and he found himself surprisingly pleased with the larger audience. "Every season a carefully selected group of Vrul is chosen to participate with the reproduction duty. The group is split in half; half to lay the eggs and the other half to fertilize them. Once fertilized, our eggs are very delicate and the slightest error can suspend development. There are four general stages of development with each containing subsets. If the egg is disturbed in the first quartile, the Vrul will be born as a Delta which is characterized by severe mental stunting resulting in a condition not dissimilar to catatonia. These deltas are generally short, strong, misshapen, obtuse with no helium sacks. They are used entirely for menial or physical tasks like cleaning or building." He was almost pleased with himself as he watched the wide eyed humans lean in a little closer. "In the second quartile you would get a Kappa, smarter and more average, but they are vapid and childish. They are very good for delicate repetitive tasks. A Beta comes from the third quartile, is as intelligent as your average human and are quite common."

The humans sat back in bemusement, "Not astonishingly bright but certainly not unintelligent. They perform tasks of modest significance, many performing complex tasks and solving complex issues. They tend to be very good with numbers and make up the bulk of our community."

The corner of Rita's mouth flexed upwards a tiny bit, "And what are you?"

"An alpha, of course. You don't become the universe's greatest surgeon with average intelligence."

He liked the surprise on the human’s faces. It felt good to upend expectations, "There are a couple levels of alpha even though they are very hard to fabricate as the eggs have to be in the precise perfect environment and most of the time it is more luck than anything else, despite all of our scientific knowledge. Alphas become our political leaders, inventors, doctors, academics and researchers to name a few. My personal theory is that an alpha has the capability to think past what is necessary and create new ideas, not possible with any other level of Vrul."

The human expelled a long gust of air from her nose, "That explains everything."

"Explains what?"

The human sighed, rolling her eyes back to stare at the sky. "Heaven almighty above, give me strength. Anyway, that was a crash course on the infirmary. You will learn on the job for the next few months before I give over total control. I want to make sure you know what the hell you are doing before I actually let you run this place."

The doctor looked at her with some measure of amusement, "I think that I can handle your barbaric little system just fine. Once I understand your rudimentary medical procedures, I am sure I will quickly replace it with my superior knowledge bringing you into a new age of advanced medicine."

She leaned back, arms crossed over her chest protecting her vital organs chin down, "You don’t have many friend on your planet, do you?"

"We do not need friends."

"How about tact?"

"What is tact?"

She closed her eyes, and took a long drawn out breath rubbing her head in her hands. "Tact is when you watch what you say so as not to insult people, even if it is true."

"Why would it be insulting if it is true?'

She sighed again deeply, cheeks expanding with the eruption of air, "It's insulting for a variety of reasons. Even if you are right, there are nicer ways of pointing those things out. Additionally, most people already know the things you are pointing out so there is no need to rub it in their faces simply to make them feel worse."

The doctor inflated his helium sack, floating a few inches off the ground, "Did I do something wrong?" He questioned. The other humans listened. They weren't even trying to be discreet about it now and openly stared as the conversation progressed.

"Yes," she responded abruptly.

"Then tell me how. My species cannot read minds and I am unable to understand your social cues as I have not been instructed in them. My species is – not – social. We have no need to be."

"Ok, you want me to be straight with you, doctor. You're an arrogant asshole which ironically is the hallmark of an excellent human surgeon. You walk in here calling us barbarians, and maybe we aren't as smart as you, so instead of deeming us, learn from us and teach us." She leaned forward towering over him menacingly, "I am doing you a favor when I say this behavior is not tolerated. The captain may allow your antics, in fact, he may even find it amusing, but it is in your best interest to learn quickly."

Krill blinked and floated back a little in nervous surprise. He was beginning to learn that a social society made things vastly more complicated than he would have anticipated. He glanced around the room to gage the reaction of the other humans. A few of them were bobbing their heads while others simply watched. He was reminded as he looked at them encircling him from all sides, that they were not simple animals.

Everything about them was designed for social interaction. The way they thought, the way they spoke, how their language functioned, even their bodies were designed and operated for sociability.

He may be in more danger than he originally anticipated.

But for some reason that didn't stop him from asking his next question, “What did you mean when you called me that?"

"Which part, arrogant?"

"No, that other one."

"An asshole?" Her arms dropped from their crossed position and her body relaxed. Whatever he had done, it had worked and she no longer seemed intent on hurting him.

He would have to pay more attention to how he was doing that. It might be useful in the future to know how to quickly diffuse a human.

"What? Do you not understand that word? Seems like something that would translate relatively well?"

"I understand the word, but I want to know why you are using it in such a manner? You used it as an insult, I am quite sure. An anatomical part is an insult?"

There was a pause around the room as the humans looked at each other."Um, actually yeah," came several voices.

A woman sitting in the back corner began counting on the fingers of one hand with a frown of concentration on her face. "Hmm... yeah. All anatomical insults are genital in nature, it seems."

"Incorrect," one of the humans called out, "you can call someone a boob."

That sparked a debate that Krill found unproductive yet interesting.

"Technically it is."

"Technically it isn't"

"Physically it isn't but society has conditioned us to consider that it is, which I argue means it counts," someone from the back of the room interjected, which only escalated the debate until Krill could barely understand what anyone was saying, just catching snippets here and there.

"I am sure there are some insults using other body parts, there has to be."

"Yeah when was the last time you called someone a crusty elbow or a lobe. You see it just doesn't work."

"Maybe now I'll start calling people wenis and wagina."

"Good luck getting those to catch on, besides those are only joke words."

"Challenge accepted."

"And who are you going to get to help you with that?"

"Bet the captain would love to help me."

Krill scooted further back in the room finding himself standing next to the medical waste, expecting this to turn into some sort of brawl. However, that didn't happen and he was beginning to question his own assumptions. It seemed that no matter how many times the humans physically threatened each other, they never actually ended up fighting.

Rita tried to raise her voice over the din, but seemed to be getting nowhere.

It was at that moment that the door at the far end of the room hissed open

"Hey, guys, hate to interrupt but, do you have a minute?"

Rita hissed in frustration already pushed to the edge by her warring staff, "Seriously, you don't have to check in every five minutes. I know how to do my job. I get it you're excited that there is an alien on board and you just can't contain yourself but please give me time to do my job."

The Captain, poking his head through the doorway, waited politely for her to finish, a relaxed smile on his face, "You know that was probably a good guess based on my prior history but I'm not actually here for that."

The PA paused in the middle of articulating a response, "Oh...?"

He stepped into the room withdrawing a hand from behind his back and held it up to the light, "I was wondering if I could borrow a band aid."

Krill buzzed in surprise, the human's hand had a line of blood dripping down one of the fingers, over the palm of his hand, around his wrist and down his forearm.

She sighed, grabbed him by his good arm and dragged him to come sit down, "What the hell did you do this time?"

He waved his injured hand, "Not important." Then he turned to look at Krill, "By the way, how is your first day going?"

Krill stared at the bleeding hand and then back to the man who was barely reacting as his vital juices were spilling down his arm. "Your species is an abomination."

Instead of reacting like Krill had insulted him, the human burst into fits of laughter, "Never has truer words been spoken."

The PA grunted in annoyance as she grabbed the captain's hand. She began cleaning the wound with some kind of chemical wipe which grew red as the blood was washed away.

"Would you stop that?"

"Stop what?"

"Encouraging his poor behavior. Your doctor is never going to learn how to act properly around humans if you just let him get away with being rude."

The captain took the chemical wipe from her hand and finished cleaning the blood off, "Look Rita, it's the guy's first day. Let him relax and sink in before we culture shock him. Besides, who said that it was him who had to conform to us? Wouldn't kill the crew to learn how to interact with species that aren't human."

"While I agree with some of that, I find that it is also important to keep him alive."

The captain balled up the wipe and underhand tossed it into the biohazard bin a foot away.

The PA glowered at his hand, "Really, you came to me for this." The doctor moved a little closer, surprised to find a tiny cut on the side of the human's hand.

"I asked for a band aid not a tourniquet, but back to my earlier point though. We are going to be hospitable, nice, civilized and teach him a few things. As of right now the Galactic Assembly thinks we are nice and I would like to keep it that way."

"You just want a reason to hang out with aliens. That has always been your excuse and that always will be your excuse," she grumbled, rummaging around in a side drawer.

"Yes, we all know that I think aliens are awesome, but we should also make a point to foster good PR. Everyone wins. It's a great, big universe out there and we are new to it so we need to learn, form friendships and make alliances."

She came back a second later and thrust a thin strip at him, which he managed to miss as it slipped through his fingers. "If you liked aliens anymore, I would suspect that you had a fetish for them."

He bent down trying to find the little package, "Maybe I do, jealous?" He picked up the thin strip, peeling it open with surprising delicacy despite his large hands. Krill noticed the remarkably complex physical structure below the skin of his hands. "I do not have an alien fetish, but imagine always believing that aliens were real while everyone told you that you were wrong to the point you were being teased because you were the weird UFO kid and then imagine that you learn you were right all along. So forgive me for being smug."

She eyed him as he finished bandaging his hand, "UFOs still aren't real."

"Well, I had to be wrong about something otherwise it wouldn't be fair to the rest of you normal people. Anyways, it just makes me more convinced that UFOs were really high tech cloaking drones that the government was using to spy on people."

"You're kidding, right?"

"Yeah, I'm just messing with you." Krill watched her flash the sclera of her eyes at him once more which did nothing against his impenetrable grin.

The Captain stood to leave and then suddenly turned to Krill, "I just remembered. What kind of accommodations do you need? A private room, do you even need a room? I am not entirely sure about how personal space works on your planet."

Krill paused to think about the question, "I do not require personal space, though I enjoy the privacy of an office space from time to time to conduct my studies in a secluded, controlled environment."

The human nodded, "Sounds fair. I'll have some of the Marines clear out one of the rooms in the administrative wing, goodness knows they need something to do before they break the ship or start some sort of riot." Krill didn't know what a Marine was very concerned that the human seemed to be taking the possibility of a riot rather lightly.

"This is assuming that you don't do the same thing first," The PA mused, tapping her foot against the whitewashed floor.

"Yeah, you're probably right."

"Speaking of which," she went on suspiciously, "How did the 'captaining' go?"

The expression he gave her was one Krill had not yet seen, a close mouthed smile with the lips pressed tight together, "Oh it went great, I did all the captainy things you can think of. How did everything here go?"

“Just fine.”

“Only fine?”

She didn't bother answering him, turning her back and walking across the room. Krill watched as she raised one of her hands over her shoulder and made a strange gesture with her five digits. The captain simply laughed though, Krill watched with a measure of fascination as the expression on his face morphed smile dropping, the lines of his jaw hardening. He called after the PA, “By the way, I sent in a request to increase our medical staff. Hopefully that will go through soon and alleviate some of the strain.”

She turned to look at him, a look of surprise on her face, “You did what?”

“My job?”

She huffed slightly, though her expression was softer than before, “You should try that more often. It’s a good look on you.”

He smiled slightly ushering Krill for the room. As soon as they were through the doors, the smile fell from his face and he grew serious.

"Lesson number two," he muttered.

"Try not to be a dick."


	11. Announcement

Everything After this is the original draft. Keep receding if you want, but a lot of what you will read will not be contained in the final draft of this story. So I suppose if you are bored keep going. 

Everything before this is the new and improved rewrite.


	12. Chapter 12

On September 13, 1848 of the human historic record, a male human by the name of Phineas P. Gage is described as surviving, a 3-foot 13 pound tamping rod shot through the left side of his face, frontal lobe, and out the top of his skull. Reportedly he spoke within minutes of the accident and walked away from the scene, though extreme personality changes were also noted after the accident.

-

He became aware of the transmission as a frantic buzzing resonated in his right lateral antennae. The sensation was neither pleasant nor unpleasant but sent a shock of awareness through his body encasing both his dorsal and ventral trunk in an eruption of fizzing like tiny bubbles rising from his insides.

In response, Dr. Krill sent out a shortwave radio burst to accept the transmission as he stepped in to check on yet another of his patients. He performed a quick scan of the unmoving figure with his thermal receptors noting the proper interior heat before stepping from the room as a transmission again burst through him with the same sensation bringing the earlier fizzing to a sort of buzzing inner static.

"Dr. Krill to the Emergency Bay, Dr. Krill to the emergency bay."

Overhead, the internal lights of the bustling medical center lengthened to a critical red. The slight adjustment added an air of urgency to his movements as he turned towards the docking bay calling up one of the railed floor transports, which quickly whisked him away, weightless, faster than he would have been able to move on his own, down and towards the emergency medical docking bay.

"Preliminary Report," he inquired by way of radio as he was pulled swiftly around a corner and down another long hallway. Other sentient entities in the hallway stepped aside for his passing barely looking up from their work, reports, or patients as he flew past. As the primary trauma physician aboard the intergalactic transit center, he was known to always be in a hurry.

"Doctor, we have an emergency SOS from the U.N.S.S Harbinger requesting immediate medical assistance."

Dr. Krill had never heard the moniker U.N.S.S. The sounds were alien to him, in no language that he understood, and he was fluent in many languages and dialects. Even his translation equipment made no sense of it leaving the first little bit untranslated even as the second came through.

Harbinger: an entity or thing that heralds the arrival of another.

Quite strange, most GA ships had numbers, not names, and such a strange name to have he thought as the transport took another corner leading him through the optics ward and out onto the central thoroughfare between the two buildings. Resting medical aids and doctors sat under the distant black sky lit only by the light of their towering, neighboring gas giant whose massive red and blue surface dominated the greater part of the night sky.

Before he knew it he had passed into the second building, that much closer to his destination.

The distant sound of engines roared above in the night sky drawing ever closer.

"Species?" he ordered as he took another corner.

He didn't have to wait long for the information to come through. A spotty, and somewhat unfinished, biological map of... wait... "What is that?' He asked, letting the question hang on the air as he tried to piece through this strange vision set before him.

"Human biological map. 23% completed, data restricted."

Humans?

Dr. Krill had never seen a human before. Sure he had heard about them, who hadn't. Their discovery and eventual involvement in the Drev war had been legendary. The stories that had been brought to them by way of transport vessels and galactic news feeds had been unbelievable, legendary and almost supernatural. For this reason, Krill doubted many of the stories. As a Vrul, he was primarily a creature of science, and didn't subscribe to impossibilities, rumors or fabrications.

He was not prone to illogical creations of the brain.

If he were to believe anything, he would believe the knowledge of his own eyes and his own senses. Besides, the stories he had heard up to this point were told on a second-hand basis, a friend of a friend of a friend once met a human, it was hardly compelling evidence.

During this time of contemplation at least three of Krill's independent cortical hemispheres had been analyzing the biological map, as little of it as there was. It was hardly worth anything. In fact, he wouldn't be likely to even attempt an autopsy with this little information.

As he drew closer to the emergency wing and its attached docking bay, Krill began to feel the rumbling. It was a powerful sensation that shook the floors and the walls as if the building planned to rattle itself apart. The transport dropped him by the doors leading into the emergency bay, where he jumped forward scuttling across the floor as fast as his legs would consent. The door ahead opened with a sharp hiss bathing him in a mist of microbial decontaminants. The rest of the trauma team had already set themselves up, and the doors to the docking bay had been thrown open to give them a view of the outer docking field.

And what a view it was.

The strange alien ship descended from the sky on a pillar of fire, a massive black monolith highlighted in flames and engineered in sharp violent lines of metal, which seemed to claw upwards towards the sky as if intending to rip its way through space at whatever cost. The sound it made was absolutely deafening, like the roaring of the stars translated from the vacuum of space directly into the engines. A few of the medical crew backed away as the ship lowered itself on its pillars of fire taking the weight of the ship as it eventually settled into a deep hunch against the ground, powerful and malefic against the dark night sky.

As soon as the engines cut, and space was plunged back into its relative silence, light spilled from the interior of the ship. It was bright white, tinted yellow, and filled with moving shadows darting quickly back and forth as the ramp lowered towards the medical bay deck. The hydraulic hiss it made as it lowered was deep and chilling echoing across the bay like a warning call from one predator to another.

The metal base of the ramp hit the deck with a powerful metallic clang that rattled the stones all the way up to the emergency bay doors.

A swarm of shadows rolled to the edge and then spilled over onto the ramp. Silhouetted against the bright light from behind, their bodies melded into a horrific amalgamation of churning limbs. Even from here, the doctor could see the way they moved: quick and lithe one moment and then sharp and jerky the next, feet never missing a step every movement perfect and precise in the way it flowed from one point to the next. There was no hesitation in their movements, every muscle taught, every nerve firing.

Powerful.

He tore his gaze away from the approaching group of predators and back towards the sterilization field. He hated turning away like this, it made his innards crawl with apprehension as he turned reaching out his appendages into the field, which enveloped his proffered limbs sterilizing them and applying the hardening gel. At his back one of the medical assistants activated a sterilization drape and threw it over his front from behind. The field fell over his body and conformed to his front sucking tight against his skin, sealing over his eyes and mouth to prevent infection.

He turned from the spot just as the creatures were pulling to a stop their backs to him. He could hardly tell where one creature began and the other ended. They were just a mass of whirling multi-colored derma.

He felt his translation equipment as it booted itself to life. From his eyes he could sense the intense radiation of bright long wave light, so much of it, so much red. By Sanctum's rings, he hadn't seen so much red in a long time, where was it coming from? The mass of writhing limbs separated now pulling apart like creatures dragging themselves from the mud pulling apart in a writhing sticky mass.

He was left with a ... strange sight. The creatures stood in a loose open circle, towering over the doctor by a good three feet in some cases. As he looked on, they turned to face him ... strange. A wire frame packed together by a bulging mass of tissue that absolutely writhed and churned like thousands of worm's pulsing together to create the creature's movement. At the apex of their body a thick round protrusion sat on a short, thick stump.

Glowing orbs stared at him from the recesses of the rubbery face glittering with a gelatinous slime as the worms below their skin contracted and released pulling the skin tight in a surprisingly mobile face. An orifice sat below two cavernous holes in the head opening and closing wetly looking like an open gash, a wound in the skin. These open wounds stretched back showing the horrific sight of yellow tinged bone coated in slime.

The worms below the skin bunched as the creatures moved rocking in agitation.

Their thick bulging limbs ended in bumpy, spidery protrusions that twitched and wriggled with their agitation. The creatures could not stay still.

The noises they made were deep and booming to his ears, dropping into the lower register of his hearing. They gurgled, clicked, growled and hissed at each other their primal grunting raising in agitation and engulfing the room with their raucous and disorderly vocalizations.

He extended his upper limbs in a placating fashion, though, deep down he could feel the fear and trepidation boiling up inside him threatening to send him retreating in the other direction, "What seems to be the problem here?"

The group grew unusually still turning to look at him. Little black spots at the center of their glowing eyes contracted like they were focusing in on a target.

"Are you blind, man?" One of the creatures boomed throwing a bulging limb wide in a strange and aggressive gesture. The doctor stepped back in agitation, the creature was unstable. The way its eyes darted about the room was jerky and unpredictable. It rocked back and forth just on the verge of movement. It could strike at any moment.

With one hand still outstretched it gave a low growl dangerously descending downwards from the opening cavity in its elastic face, "HELP him!"

Another spidery hand reached out, one of the other creatures, gripped the first by the arm heavily in a show of dominating force, "Calm down Lieutenant, its ok. I'm ok."

Dr. Krill looked forward to examine the creature that spoke. It was standing, rather unsteadily at the center of the group, supported by no less than three of its companions, the source of the bright red wavelengths. Unlike its counterparts, it was very still staring forward though only one eye was visible in the face. The other was obscured by a metal rod that..... seemed to pass into the ocular socket.

The doctor did a quick once over. Nothing seemed to be wrong, it was coherent, speaking, and supporting itself rather well. He could see nothing wrong with it from where he stood. It appeared just like the rest of them, "I am sorry, I don't see the problem."

Uproar.

He almost ran, and even then, he couldn't stop the high-pitched keening that broke from his mouth as the creatures snapped. Their voices raised in angry powerful bellows that rattled him in place. They stalked closer in their anger.

"Are you kidding me!"

"Some doctor you are."

"GUYS, KNOCK IT OFF!" This bellow was so loud it cowed the unstable creatures causing them to curl inwards in submission and stalk backwards though their eyes still remained trained upon Dr Krill's large dark pupils threatening to pull him in like the weight of a black hole

"You ... haven't seen a human before, have you?" The creature at the center stated conversationally. Out of all of them, he seemed the most stable, the calmest, at his back, the other humans continued to support him.

"I have not, no."

"Well, I am going to give you a quick anatomy lesson." The human raised a limb and motioned towards his face, "This, this right here sticking out of my face... let's just say it ain't a fashion statement."

The doctor moved forward a little to get a closer look, but the human was a much taller making it difficult to see.

"So you think you can help me out, doc, because I think I have something stuck in my frontal lobe?" Not once did the human's voice waver or crack. He would have assumed that was always how the humans talked, but the agitation of the others proved that was not the case.

Dr. Krill had the medical team move the human into a more comfortable position while pushing back the other humans so they stood looming at the other end of the room a wall of impenetrable rolling flesh.

He leaned in close to peer at the human. It was very, very strange. A bipedal endoskeleton operated by a series of contracting and lengthening fibers, triggered by electrical pulse and insulated by a runny stew of fluid kept in place by a smooth sack covered in tiny sensory cilia. The more he looked the more the bio map began to make sense. A large muscular pump in the center of the chest pushed this life-sustaining fluid through its body. He could see it now, through the protective sack that held the creature together. Tiny lines of blue..... it was.... sort of gross. Didn't seem right that he should be able to see it's innards from the outside.

"Hey doc, you plan on doing anything at all about the screwdriver in his brain?" One of the humans snarled from his spot on the other side of the room.

The doctor turned to look at him. Had the human spoken wrong? Something about the thing being in his brain? That didn't seem right. He was a trauma surgeon in one of the largest hospitals in the known universe, and he had never seen ANYONE survive cortical trauma. That was the rule of it; hit the brain it was dead, no bother even checking. "I think you might be exaggerating just a bit," he retorted tilting the human's head carefully this way and that.

"That screwdriver is like eight inches long and half of it is inside his eye."

"He would be dead."

"Well, he isn't"

"He would at least be incapacitated." The doctor shot back, "The trauma seems minimal judging by the behavior."

Something gripped him tightly about his upper appendage. He felt a jolt of fear shoot through his trunk as he was pulled face to face with the human freezing him in place by the large green iris and the black void at its center, "I won't be this calm for very long doc, luckily for you the human brain can block pain signals in dire emergencies, but it isn't going to last forever, and then we are all going to be very, very upset."

Now that seemed like an outright lie, "Are you sure your cortical zone is located in your head because....."

The human's face churned for a moment pulling the wound of a mouth downwards at the corners, "I think I would know where my own brain is."

"If that was the case this would be a very serious injury," the doctor realized. He had just called in for any extra medical notes on the humans. He was primarily a trauma surgeon, but additionally he was a phenomenal doctor. He had trained his entire life for this position, just like any member of his species would.....

"Yeah, accidental lobotomies tend to be kind of serious, that's why we came here, as an emergency instead of slapping a bandage on it and calling it good." Behind the translation, he could hear a slow modulation in the human's voice raising a few octaves as it spoke. It may have been a barbaric system of speaking, but it was quite complex and even more fascinating.

The notes had come in just then... and what he saw ...by Sanctums Rings ... he suddenly realized what he was looking at and could hardly believe the information in front of him. The sight... it was horribly gruesome, he hadn't seen anything like this outside of the morgue. Red spilled down the front of the creature's face from the remnants of the destroyed eye socket. The optical orb was completely destroyed almost surely gone, and the red, which he now understood as blood, ran freely down its face and neck before dribbling onto its chest. Even now, knowing what this creature was, he couldn't fathom how it was still standing. The small nerves that ran through its face and skull should have been sending absolutely blinding pain signals to the appropriate cortical area, but here it sat calmly eyeing him with that remaining orb, so still and so patient. Its spidery hands sat folded in its lap.

As the information continued to flow in, he got to work half fascinated and half horrified by the scene before him. The rest of the medical staff, unaware of the dire situation moved sluggishly until galvanized by the doctors shrill orders scurrying to and fro like a pack of Kinlits searching for food.

"Alright everyone we have a prefrontal, deep cortical trauma."

"Deep cortical?" one of them wondered in confusion. They had never treated a cortical injury before. Those were generally treated out back, by a furnace or a freezer before being launched into space with the rest of the medical waste.

"YES deep cortical trauma, try to keep up please." With a quick burst, he partially inflated the helium sack at the back of his head, neck and shoulders, giving him more buoyancy as he rotated himself around the human calculating the precise angle of the entry wound. Angled as it was, it would surely have destroyed the eye, there was no doubt about it, but the way it had cut through the skull, and at that angle reduced the amount of the object that would actually have gone into cortical tissue.

Comparing his estimates to the biological map in his notes, he determined that there was a very high likelihood the object had actually slid into one of the cortical folds lessening the damage even further. Of course, even a little bit of damage to the brain should have been instant death, but what SHOULD have happened did not matter now. What mattered at this moment is what DID happen and what it would take to keep this human alive.

"Prepare the surgical suite," he barked to one of the assistants, "and get the rest of them out of here before they contaminate the entire floor."

As he re-examined the human, he found the color of the dermal layer to have lost its rosy tone. It would be important to keep him reactive as long as possible. The aperture of the eye would be an important indicator of neural function.

He shined a light in it, "Does your species give you names, Human?" He asked as the dark aperture shrunk at the touch of the light. "Captain Adam Vir," the human responded distantly though his pulse was still strong, and the bleeding around the wound had ceased. Interesting, humans had more than one name like the Tesraki, and a title like the Rundi. The Vrul generally had only one name, and the use of a job as a title had only been adopted once they had joined the Galactic Assembly.

"Tell the techs to bring in some imaging equipment to the operating room." While giving his orders, he was still examining the additional notes that had been transmitted to him from the human's very own medical database. It was difficult to understand, and the classification system was an absolute wreck, but with four separate cortical hemispheres, and three of them working together to puzzle out the issue, he thought he understood.

The human would require a spinal block for paralysis and..... interesting. The general method of surgery required the human be unconscious for the duration of the surgery, and that involved the chemical shutdown on the frontal operating cortex. The method was either applied directly into the bloodstream or applied by gas to the lungs which brought oxygen into the blood. He would send the information to their resident chemic. Of course the doctor could have whipped up a batch of the stuff in a pinch if it was required, he needed to be at least passable at chemistry to do his job, but he preferred to keep his talents in the realm of medicine and nothing more, if he could help it.

His other orders were given out quickly, and before the next short cycle was over, he had placed an intravenous tube into one of the human's veins, applied a clotting agent to the wound, acquired a respiratory kit, a nerve block and the magnetic generating fields. He would need to keep the human upright to avoid allowing the object to slide further into the brain, once the body was secured, he would gas the human, secure an airway, get some immediate imaging and then begin the operation.

The human was moved quickly from the emergency bay and into the operating room. They would need to monitor the heart, breathing and the gas levels within the blood if they wanted to keep him alive. Additionally, he wanted cranial wave readings because it wouldn't do if he went and added more damage to what had already been done.

Their chemic came in a minute later with the proper formula.

The human's remaining eye rolled listlessly in its socket. It wasn't a good sign, compared to the other humans he was growing rather lethargic. He decided to order the imaging first, and was immediately rewarded with a direct feed by way of radio signal. The image... was surprising. The object had definitely gone into the brain, there was no question about it, but it had cleanly broken through the back of the eye socket severing the optic nerve before sliding miraculously between two of the gyri causing as little damage as one could possibly have hoped for. Of course, removing the object was likely to do more harm than the actual entry wound had.

Any other doctor couldn't have hoped for much of an outcome. Sure the human was functioning now, but removal of the object would surely cause severe neural issues, if not extreme dysfunction in countless areas...but Krill wasn't just any doctor.

He was the number one highest rated trauma surgeon in the known universe.

Not just any other doctor.

His team of surgical assistants moved forward now. The chemist applied a gracious dose of the chemical agent to the human who sagged, and then passed out in under ten seconds of application. Almost simultaneously, two other members of the surgical team had applied the spinal block, and calibrated the magnetic fields, which slowly began to hoist the human off the ground and into proper position for the surgery. Bloodied clothing was cut away and discarded as medical waste as the rest of the human was sterilized.

The doctor stood at the back watching as his medical team established a controlled airway on the human before opening the surgical floor to him.

He wouldn't need more than his own four limbs and a single assistant for this operation.

Filled with his newfound anatomical knowledge, and a proper view of the human in a controlled environment, he couldn't help but be anything other than fascinated, and the more he looked the more fascinated he became.

This thing, this creature, was like nothing he had ever seen. It was frightening and thrilling at the same time as he moved to begin the surgery, he suddenly became aware of his strange and unique position in the galaxy. He would be the first Vrul, nay the first entity in the known universe to perform a cortical operation on a trauma patient.

No one, no one ever that he knew of had ever performed or attempted to perform what he was about to do now, and on a human no less.

He was on the forefront of new medical science. He was going where no one else had ever gone before. Hundreds if not thousands of papers would be written about what he was about to do. He would write many of those papers. NOTHING like this had ever been seen before, and here he was with that knowledge ripe for the taking, in the unique position to take it. At this moment in time, he understood more about humans than any medical professional he had ever met.

The human species, as far as he understood it, had two main sexes, this one was a generally healthy young male, exact age being undermined at this moment. The male human weight nearly 200 units and reached a height about twice that of the doctor himself. The coloring of his outer layer, epidermis, was a creamy white, almost translucent, a fact which allowed the skin a pinkish hue from the subcutaneous blood supply. Though the human appeared mostly naked of fur on first examination, second examination proved the human was absolutely covered in a light layer of fuzz thickening about the legs and arms and receding about the trunk. He couldn't have been sure what these strange cilia were used for. A part of him assumed they were some sort of sensory organ to detect pressure changes, or even act like a form of whisker, but he couldn't know for sure without experimentation or observation. These patches of fuzz thickened atop the head where it turned itself into course spiky tufts tawny yellow in color. Only three other places on the body demonstrated an even remotely similar hair structure, but their purpose was beyond the doctor's understanding.

There was just so much he didn't know, and every second he was confronted with something even more strange, terrifying and wonderful, all at the same time. It was an absolutely fascinating creature. He could have spent his life studying the skin itself and still understood nothing.

And that's when he noticed the difference. He had been so focused on the injury to the eye that he hadn't even had time to thoroughly examine the rest of the body. Down one of the legs, the skin was whole and smooth without break, but the other leg.... well there WAS no other leg. There was nothing there. The flesh itself stopped halfway down the thigh which was socketed under a sleeve which cupped the severed limb and continued downwards to create a SIMULATED limb.

The human was living with a MISSING LIMB! Not only that, but they had gone and replaced it with a REPRODUCTION. On a cursory inspection he found the counterfeit limb was a mixture of titanium, rubber, and aluminum. Cordlike structures inside the metal casing mimicked the writhing muscle under the skin while fine tiny, hair like wires mimicked the nervous system itself. He had never known a creature to survive without its limbs, not when the limbs themselves were an established part of the body anyway. Sure there was some species that regenerate parts of their anatomy after removal and still others that were born with genetic defects. But they never lived longer than a few years at most and the quality of life was subpar at best. This... he wouldn't have been able to tell by just watching the human.

But the greatest surprise, well that came from the simple fact that the human was still alive to undergo the procedure, and remained alive even as the doctor's practiced hands removed the object from the brain, through the broken socket, and out to a waiting tray. The result was less gruesome than it could have been. The socket itself required debriding, the eye was completely gone, and he was only able to salvage part of the optic nerve, whatever that might have been worth. Though the back of the eye socket had been broken, the rest of the skull remained relatively intact, and after the wound had been packed and bandaged and equipment put into place to monitor intracranial pressure, the human looked almost as if nothing had happened.

It was still breathing, that powerful pump inside its massive chest was still thundering away.

It was nothing short of a miracle, and the doctor didn't subscribe to miracles.

The brain waves remained steady.

Returning to his office, after overseeing the stabilization of his patient, he was overcome with awe for what he had just done, what he had just seen. So many thoughts fluttered through all four hemispheres of his brain that he could hardly keep them all straight. He had saved a human's life..... he had performed brain surgery; the patient was going to live. He was going to be the foremost researcher the medical field had ever seen and all because some human had to go get himself poked through the eye.

But it wasn't just the thought of the knowledge he was gaining, or what he would soon be able to share with the medical field, no, there was something else, and even as he looked outside, outwards and upwards towards the tranquil surface of their neighboring gas giant, he realized his sense of awe was not just for the procedure that he had performed, but for the human he had performed it on.

Because what kind of creature can go and survive a wound like that.

What kind of monster has the right to defy fate?

***

Captain Adam Vir of the U.N.S.S Harbinger awoke to the awareness of a horrible itching sensation high on his upper thigh. He wasn't quite sure where he was or what was going on, but one thing was for sure.

This couldn't be allowed to last.

He cracked his eyes only to be immediately and forcibly blinded by the overhead lights. Weakly he raised his hands to block out the beams feeling stiff and woozy. Something was blocking out the vision from his right eye leaving everything dark. He reached up to his face running a hand over the bandages wrapped around his skull.

That was weird. He didn't remember any accident.

It took longer than he would have liked for his vision to adjust, and once it did, he ended up with more questions than answers. Despite what he thought had been blinding light, the room was actually rather dim. The floor was a matte grey/purple color, and strips of eerie blue light wound around the top corners of the room casting their bluish glow down to highlight the strange equipment which surrounded him. None of which he recognized.

He turned his head to groggily look down at his body, which was practically plastered with tiny little sensors which adhered to the skin; on his hands, on his neck, on his chest, on his stomach and so on. He even had an IV in his right arm, which was placed surprisingly well.

His one complaint.... there was no bed in the room, but he wasn't lying on the floor. He was suspended in the air legs and arms floating freely within a relatively restricted space like an astronaut in zero gravity. He wasn't sure what kind of technology could have allowed that, and while it was cool, he didn't exactly appreciate the cold breeze that, even now, licked seductively down his spine like an icy lover. He tried to move, tried to sit up like he would have on a bed, but the operation failed leaving him suspended and immobile in midair.

He tried to call for help, but nearly choked on his own dry tongue gasping and coughing against the sandpaper plastered to his throat. Off to his left side, the side he could see from, one of the strange machines began blinking. He tried his best to summon up some spit to wet his throat, and called for help again.

It was a pretty good attempt, if he had been trying to channel the voice of an eighty year smoker, but he doubted that even if someone had been standing across the room, they would have been able to hear it. The machine began to blink more frantically.

He drew in a large breath determined this time to make himself heard, but at that moment, one of the walls to his right dissolved away, and a figure stepped through the newly created opening. Surprises like that were surely not good for his heart at a time like this. The machines by his side began blinking with even greater urgency as he tried to tug himself from the forces that still held him in place.

"Relax," the creature said to him as it approached slowly, "I am the doctor that performed your surgery, and am now here for the post-op examination."

"Surgery?" Captain Vir wondered, single eye dropping to look at this "doctor" and was momentarily distracted from his earlier question. "Cool," he heard himself murmur. The alien that now stood before him couldn't have been more than three feet tall looking like some sort of cross between an ant, and a bacteriophage. He had four lower limbs: two sticking out from the front and two sticking out from the back; each of the legs had a single joint at the analogue of a knee bent at about ninety degrees to just before ninety degrees. Unlike an ant, the trunk of its body rose from the junction of its four legs rising into something that resembled a torso, with chest and shoulders. On its upper trunk it had four limbs, two on either side of the torso stacked on top of each other. In this way its anatomy was almost human, it had two sets of arms and a structure resembling a chest, or two considering it had two sets of arms to support.

It even had a slim neck that supported a surprisingly bulbous head, on which sat, what must have been two eyes, hexagonal prisms in a ruddy orange color not dissimilar to that of a fly. The eyes took up a good half of its face leaving a low opening for a mouth, which was nothing more than a slit in its face. On either side of the head, two thick antennae stuck up and a little back. When the doctor turned, he could see the creature's spherical head split apart in the back to form four separate hemispheres.

A drape of folded skin lay over the back of the head, down the neck and onto the upper shoulders. He couldn't have said what it was for.

"So what are you, anyway?" the human wondered as the "Doctor" approached. Without warning he suddenly found himself shifting from a reclining position into a vertical one floating forward against his will.

The doctor stopped in front of him, "You ask a lot of questions for someone with mild brain damage. Is that normal for your species?"

"Mild.... .Brain damage. Now hold on. When or how did I end up with brain damage?"

"You don't remember?" The doctor inquired stepping in to examine the machines.

"Well ...no. I remember we were working on repairs in engineering and then I woke up here."

The doctor stepped away from his machines and then moved to stand at the human's side. With a sound like an inflating balloon, the sack at the flap of skin at the back of his head neck and shoulders began to inflate until he was at least 40% his original size and floating a good inch above the floor.

The human's eye widened, "Woah, awesome." The little doctor kicked lightly at the floor floating a few feet into the air as he began unwinding the bandages.

"As an answer to your question, human. I am a Vrul."

"Oh, I've heard about you guys. You're the ones who only work one job their entire lives. Supposed to be like geniuses or something.... like Vulcans."

"Like what?"

"Uh, never mind," the human muttered. The bandage was beginning to unravel in a long dangling strip that hung towards the floor. There was no blood, but the bandage was stained yellow from an unknown fluid. Finally, the bandage was off leaving only the gauze. Whoever had put the thing on had done a pretty damn good job. Not a hint of light was leaking through.

The doctor reached up and plucked at the edges of the adhesive pulling the bloody piece of gauze from his face.

He didn't see anything.

He didn't see ANYTHING.

Out of reflex, he tried to reach his hand up to feel at his eye. Perhaps it was swollen shut, but the doctor slapped his hand away, "No touching! I've read your biological map, absolutely covered in a biome of germs, and now you want to go and touch an open wound."

The human lowered his hand, but inside his heart was beginning to pound even harder, "Why can't I see?"

The little doctor didn't even pause in his examination, "Your eye was destroyed during the accident. I was able to save some of the optic nerve and remove the object without any more damage to the brain, but the eye itself was unsalvageable. I foresee you will have more of an issue from the missing eye than you will from the small amount of brain damage, which I might say is absolutely ridiculous for me to even be saying-"

The doctor continued talking, but the human didn't hear him. If he had been standing on the floor, it would have fallen out from under him. Even so, the room around him began to spin, and his entire body went completely cold. It couldn't be true, it just couldn't be, he needed that eye! He couldn't be a pilot without it, he could be discharged. His career could be over. His stomach churned with the horrible realization, his mind was filled with the grotesque images of an eyeless face staring back at him from the darkness like some macabre horror show. Was that what he was to become, a disfigured jobless monster living off the charity of strangers, a thing to be pitied at the same time it was repulsed?

His stomach continued to churn, nausea building up in his throat which had been constricted under the power of, what felt like, a steel vice. The next breath that escaped his throat was somewhere between a gasp and a whimper. Tears sprang to his eyes, and he cursed that the injury had destroyed his eye but not his tear ducts.

He fought back the feeling holding in another gasping breath as he did so.

The doctor pulled back away in alarm before returning, probing at the human's neck for a pulse. He tried to pull away against the strange touch of the unfeeling alien. He just needed..... a few seconds. He tried taking long, deep breaths to slow his heart squeezing his eyes shut. It felt strange ... not having an eye for his lid to close over.

When he finally opened his eyes, he found the alien staring at him in worried confusion, hands raised as if he wasn't entirely sure what to do. "Are you having some sort of attack, human?" he asked.

The captain shook his head, "No I..... I'm fine.

"You don't look fine."

"Of course I'm NOT FINE!" He didn't intend to raise his voice in the way he did, but there it was, before he could control it. The doctor floated away, and though the doc's face remained motionless, he had the distinct impression of fear which radiated from its body. Before he knew it the words were flying out of his mouth unbidden, "Of course I'm not fine, I-I'm missing an eye.... I.... my career is over..... I.... my life. Everything I worked for." His future was a black hole that was rising up to swallow him whole, hopeless, nothingness, blackness

The little doctor stared at him with a blank, uncomprehending expression, "What brought you to that conclusion?"

He would have liked to have taken the news stoically, like the heroes in the old movies would have, like his idols, like his father, but the bitterness bubbled up from his throat like a hot spring, "You don't get it," he whispered, voice barely audible. "They will discharge me now, take away my ship, I'll be jobless, homeless...... a hideous....."

"You don't look much different to me," the creature cut in examining the machines to his side.

A flare of anger built up in his chest, "Without my eye I lose everything."

The little creature turned to face him now, its umber-tinted orange eyes flashing with the ghosts of the blue light cast from the overhead strips, "Then get a new eye."

His argument was caught in his throat, "I.... what?"

The doctor got back to his work examining the wound, "I said, get a new eye. I notice you have an analogue leg, and if you can survive without a leg, I am going to make the logical leap that your species can probably survive with analogue eyes as well."

The human's argument was caught in his throat, and he opened and closed his mouth with unspoken arguments. Fake eye... that was IT! That was it! How could he have been so dumb? Of course! He could totally get a new one, a better one. It would be completely fine. They could hardly argue with a captain that could see infrared, or ultraviolet or.... or altitude vectors. It was perfect.

He could feel the relief draining into his body from the top of his head all the way down to the metallic toes of his missing leg. He found himself eyeing the alien doctor a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "They weren't kidding about you all being smart were they."

The Vrul didn't look at him but kept quietly at his work, "No." His response wasn't egoistic or anything, it was just a statement of fact.

"I didn't get your name," the human ventured watching with a crossed eye as the doctor dabbed at his socket.

"Krill."

"Just one name? No family name?"

"My species does not have family units. One name is all that is needed." The human winced a little as the doctor: Krill, dabbed at his missing eye.

"Alright then Spock," when the only thing he got back was a blank stare, he rolled his one good eye. "Never mind, tell me doctor, have you been practicing medicine for your whole life then?"

"Yes."

"Really verbose, aren't you?" The human muttered, attempting to reach down to scratch his thigh but finding that he couldn't move his arms more than a few feet. "So, it would be safe to say that you are an experienced doctor?"

With his examination finished, the doctor, Krill, floated back deflating a bit to retrieve some fresh bandages, re-inflating and returning to apply the dressing, "I am."

"How good are you? Good like chief of surgery for this hospital good or good like Dr. House is good?" Still nothing. He really needed to stop it with the pop culture references, especially the ones that were almost two thousand years old.

The doctor finished his bandaging and leaned back to observe his hand work, "You still have your brain function, but if that is insufficient to answer your question, I have been commissioned the universe's most skilled trauma surgeon for six cycles in a row."

Of course the human couldn't have known about the hungry look that crossed his face at that moment, or how he made the small doctor feel as if thousands of tiny bugs were crawling on his insides, but he did notice the blossoming idea in his head, "The best trauma surgeon in the known universe eh.... bet the surgeries get a little boring around here. I mean, if you're as good as you say, things probably don't surprise you much anymore."

The doctor glanced at him where he stood next to the biohazard bin, but he didn't say anything, so the human continued. "You're the best doctor in the known universe and your stuck here stitching up people's broken limbs and open wounds, probably nothing special. I mean this is the first brain surgery you have ever performed. On my planet we've been doing brain surgery for a couple thousand years now. Every surgeon and their dog has performed brain surgery." Ok, maybe he was lying a little, but that hardly mattered.

Something in his words had caught the little doctor's attention, and he turned scuttling a little closer to the human on his four spidery limbs, "What do you mean, human?"

He shrugged noncommittally, as best he could in the current situation, "I mean we were doing brain surgery successfully before we invented the radio."

That made the doctor stop in his tracks. He looked as if he was about to call the human out for spouting complete nonsense, but he kept going, "Yeah, you heard me, but I mean you guys invented rocket science before brain surgery. I suppose you guys can't even transplant limbs or organs?" he barked a laugh as the doctor sputtered.

"Transplant limbs, organs what do you even mean?"

"I mean we routinely use body parts from recently deceased people to fix the broken parts of sick or injured people. Generally we prefer only reattaching people's own limbs, but someone else's will do in a pinch." The wolfish grin was back, he had the creature right where he wanted him.

"But I'll stop talking, you're probably not interested, it's not the kind of surgery you're used to, human stuff you know, totally crazy, very dangerous. No non-human has ever attempted the procedures that we do." He let himself go quiet then watching the little doctor shift in place looking back and forth between him and his work.

And then the little asshole left, just turned and walked out the door without so much as a goodbye. Leaving the human suspended in midair, unable to move and without so much as the comfort of conversation to keep him from returning to the issue of his eye.

What was he even thinking anyway?

It's not like it would actually work.


	13. Chapter 13

Hemispherectomy - A type of procedure perfected and performed by humans, which requires the removal of one hemisphere of the brain, usually done to treat seizure disorders resistant to medication, or other surgical intervention.

WARNING: Procedure only possible on human subjects.

-

A warm breeze drifted through the open window causing the lacy white curtains to shiver gently from its careless caress bringing with it the distant sound of rhythmic sprinklers along with the rich, earthy smell of freshly cut grass. Streams of golden sunlight spilled through the gauzy fabric and down onto the plush, carpeted floor forming pools of molten warmth from the light of a late afternoon sun.

Over the sound of the sprinklers, the voices of children swelled as they approached from down the street. Happy laughter echoed off the houses proclaiming the eternal flame of childhood. Such happiness was fanned by the simple freedom of a Friday afternoon and the short reprieve from confined classroom walls.

In the front yard, the noise of an engine rose to a slight purring as the automated lawn-bot began its careful patterned trek about the pristinely manicured front lawn. The smell of cut grass only grew stronger, a pleasant, calming smell. A group of teenagers sailed past the house floating smoothly through the air on their nearly-silent hover-skates, vanishing up the block their laughter trailing behind them as they went.

Inside the warm, sunny confines of the house, an automated wash-bot lightly scrubbed a soiled pan dunking it into the sink once or twice before returning to dry the object and place it away, neatly, in one of the sealed cupboards. Not a few feet away, bent low over the dining room table, a slim woman, in a pair of baggy pants and a work flannel maneuvered a piece of denim through a sewing computer. The light whir of the machine could barely be heard over the sound of the house bots. A thin ringlet of blond hair looped down onto her shoulder, and she paused to brush it idly away sleeves rolled up to elbow, tongue stuck delicately in between her teeth as she worked.

Done with the last seam, she retrieved the item and held it up to inspect purring with satisfaction. Martha Vir had originally received her Ph.D in global history with a focus on the post-cold war era and the information age, however when teaching history lost its appeal to her she had started her own business recreating, and helping others to recreate historically accurate period clothing.

Since her childhood, and even long before that, the modern world had experienced cycling trends in fashion. Sometimes someone new and avant-guard would step forward and create something virgin in the public eye, but then the old would reappear, and everyone would be clamoring to don the apparel of their favorite era of history. Just recently, her business had seen an exponential spike in revenue as the current fashion tended towards the, pick your favorite time period and dress accordingly. In any major city, you could walk down the street and run into a Victorian era gentleman sporting a cane, only to be immediately waylaid by a 1970s punk wearing leather and sporting a frosty green mohawk.

She herself enjoyed the simple provincial fashion of the early to mid-21st century which had a focus on jeans, in a myriad of styles, and the flannel of the Welsh farmer adopted and popularized by the American fashion industry during that era.

Her thoughts drifted back to her work, as she folded the garment and began disassembling her sewing kit, disconnecting the power cell, and fitting its pieces snugly in the contoured case. Of course, she could have programmed her computer to do all of this for her; the technology was easy to find and relatively cheap in the current economy, but she always felt the clothing she made was more authentic if made by hand.

Besides, there was nothing more satisfying than making something with her own hands. She finished packing her equipment, and was just folding up her squares of fabric when the front door burst open only to slam shut immediately after. The sudden noise startled, and she knocked into the sturdy kit with a flailing elbow causing a shooting pain to spike up and down her arm.

"Shoot!" She exclaimed rubbing her arm vigorously before turning towards the closed door. The drawer on the side table was still rattling from the violent crash, though there was no one in sight. She stood straight adjusting her fly-away hair before turning to the wall, "Prism, what time is it?" The glowing strip of blue light that ran around the upper edge of the living room blinked to life and responded in a pleasingly ambiguous voice, "It is currently 3:20 pm Friday May 16th."

"Thank you, Prism," she murmured, absently placing her kit back on the table, adjusting her sleeves and walking into the hallway. The streaming golden light from the front windows was cut off casting the short corridor into warm spring shadow. Three of the four doorways were closed permitting the darkness to grow even deeper within unlit corners, however, a single strip of golden light cut through a crack under one of the doorways illuminating a small portion of the hallway in that same afternoon glow.

She stepped up to the door knocking gently against the familiar, aged wood as she simultaneously and softly pushed the door inward, "Adam ... sweetheart , is everything ok?" The question was wholly unnecessary, for she already knew the answer.

Her youngest son was sprawled flat on his bed, face down disheveled blond hair sticking chaotically in all directions. His over-sized sneakers hung over the side of the bed, floppy untied laces dangling towards the floor. As small and thin as he was, his large, black t-shirt and baggy cargo shorts seemed to absolutely engulf him. His thin shoulders shook silently

He didn't answer her, but simply lay there with his head tucked under the crook of his elbow. That was fine, she could wait, so quietly she took a seat next to the still form admiring the eclectic nature her little boy's room. He would talk when he was ready.

The room could have been a museum of NASA and popular science fiction for the past two thousand years. Faces, many of them long dead, some over two thousand years gone, stared down from the walls immortalized in reproduced holo-images and vintage posters.

If it involved an alien you could be sure that her son had searched for it, seen it, studied it, and become a fan of it. It didn't matter when the book had been written, when the movie was produced, or the documentary aired even if it required him to go searching through the most arcane archives in long forgotten repositories or on the internet through thousands of years of abandoned data, then he would do it.

Evidence of the young boy's obsession littered the desks and shelves with hand-painted figurines, moon rocks, jars of Mars sand, and towers of drawings yet to find their place on the already-cluttered walls.

Concerned green eyes glanced over at the small figure noting, with satisfaction, that the shaking had died down to the occasional childhood spasm which comes after tears. She reached over a gentle hand placing it on his back between the shivering shoulder blades, "Are those kids being ignorant again?"

"T-they j-just d-don't get it!" She furrowed her face in sympathy as he struggled to push the words out past his uncooperative diaphragm and it's sporadic bursts of air. Growing frustrated with his unintelligibility, he sat up. His round cheeks were puffy and red damp with tears which he aggressively tried to brush away. His large, green eyes were still filled with unshed tears as he struggled to control his own body, "T-they w-wont listen to me.... I s-s-said that mathematical probability s-says that there are aliens, but t-they told me that even t-two thousand years ago they didn't believe in aliens."

Martha frowned, "Well, that's not true at all. Scientists of the day thought it might be very likely." 

"I- I TRIED to tell them that!" he exclaimed, "b-but they just w-won't listen. B-billions of galaxies, trillions of stars and- and they think we are the ONLY ones. Then they said that if there WERE aliens then they would have at least found Voyager 1 and contacted us, but MOM Voyager is only like 691billion 891million 200 thousand miles from earth. THAT ISN'T EVEN A LIGHTYEAR."

She gently patted his shoulder reminding him to use his inside voice, which he managed, with some difficulty, "The c-closest stars to us are Alpha Centauri A and B which is 4.3 lightyears from earth, and AND their only possibly habitable planet is Proxima B and it's tidally locked with their star making life unlikely, plus they would have to FIND Voyager first."

She sighed past an affectionate smile and pulled him a little closer to rest against her shoulder. She kissed the top of his head, "You are one remarkable kid, you know that?"

He sniffed. "You're just saying that cause you're my mom," he muttered, voice muffled partially by her shirt.

She frowned pulling back to look at him. By now his tears had dried leaving streaks down his cheeks and a dull redness to his otherwise bright green eyes. She brushed back a stray strand of straw-blond hair only to frown again when it stuck back up, "Adam, what is our one rule in this house?"

He looked down for the longest moment, and then with a long extended sigh he answered, "Mom is always right....."

She smiled smugly and ruffled his hair, "That's right, and never forget it, besides you're my son so how could you be anything other than intelligent, incredible, and awesome."

That coaxed a smile from his tight lips as she pulled him playfully closer, and didn't stop, not until she had transformed the smile into a proper laugh: like all good mothers: an alchemist of emotion. He wriggled from her arms only to collapse onto the mattress panting heavily from the laughter that bubbled up from his throat.

She felt the smile stretch the corners of her mouth which throbbed from overuse going back the past two minutes. With a deep sigh, she got up and walked over to the curtains pulling them shut cutting off the stream of honey golden light and kicking up the lazy dustmotes into a micro-whirlwind. Her son looked up from the bed wide green eyes scrunched in confusion, but she kept silent walking over to the bed and falling to lay next to him staring up at the ceiling, "Prism, activate the Projector."

At her command, the entire room suddenly erupted into a condensed micro-universe of trailing stars, swirling nebulae and spiral galaxies. She reached up dragging her hand through an arm of the Milky-Way causing stars to erupt around her fingers, spill outwards, and then formed back together. She held her hand still allowing the last of the stars to trickle off her fingertips like droplets of water. Turning her head she looked to find a copy of that universe reflected back at her on the surface of those wide green eyes.

She reached out taking his smaller hand in hers, "Adam."

"Yeah, mom."

She turned her eyes back towards the floating specks, "I believe one day, when you're older, you'll get to see all of this for yourself." She squeezed his hand tight in hers.

"You'll prove them wrong."

****

Waking up could only have been equated to trying to crawl up a sand dune wearing lead boots. His throat was coated in sandpaper, his single eye was glued shut, and his own breath tasted like Satan himself had crawled down his throat and died. When he finally managed to pull himself into some groggy semblance of wakefulness, he immediately wished he hadn't. Whatever kind of alien drug they had him on, it was absolute garbage, zero out of ten, would not recommend. He considered petitioning for a suggestion box to urge them never use this drug ever again on anyone ever. He wondered if he was the first human to experience this poison masquerading as medicine and vowed to let the doc know that they could take some lessons from the pharmaceutical companies on Earth. He has been drugged before and with results almost worth repeating.

Smacking his lips together in a useless attempt to scour away the mouthful of nasty, he peeled his one eyelid from the cement gunk, and glanced groggily about the room. The light was dim, casting the room into that strange eerie tone of blue he had come to see as familiar in the past few days. The doctor hadn't let him see anyone, though he had heard arguments from out in the hallway. He had, however, managed to convince the spidery creature to get him a proper bed instead of suspending him perpetually in the air like a cosmic arachnid.

It wasn't all that comfortable mind you, but at least there wasn't a chill breeze drifting through his personal business. He leaned his head back slowly resting it against the surprisingly unforgiving surface. He had wanted to make a call to his superiors to inform them of the situation and request medical leave so that he could look into getting a new eye, but that hadn't been an option.

Off to the side, a sharp hiss erupted into the room, and he turned to confront the source as light from the hallway cut inwards chasing away the eerie blueness replacing it with a sharp white light, which his single eye struggled to interpret. He squinted against the brightness and raised a hand to shade his face. He expected to see the doctor standing in the doorway, but was surprised to find that, this time, he had company.

"No more than twenty cycles, you hear me?" the doctor scolded. "He still needs rest, and he better not move around too much." Captain Vir couldn't help but smile a little at the somewhat studious and commanding nature of the creature. The alien doctor reminded him of a smaller more condensed version of his high school world history teacher: a little studious, aggressively blunt, and bossy in an endearing sort of way. In response to his demands, the small group of humans muttered their agreement and were finally permitted to step into the room. The wall closed behind them, but the light above their heads adjusted to more comfortable levels.

Captain Vir just managed to shake off the rest of his drug-induced weariness and smile at his visiting crew members which now included his first lieutenant, his Navigation's Officer, their ship's linguist, and to his surprise, the older and rather graying marine sergeant.

The group of them gathered around his sickbed looking relieved by the simple fact that he was conscious and functioning instead of drooling all over himself, which could have been a distinct possibility.

All together, they looked aggressively out of place in this alien building, surrounded by alien things, and alien equipment, but somehow, they managed to look unphased as if they spent plenty of time planet side on alien home worlds.

"It's good to see you awake, Captain, embarrassed to say we were a little worried," his first lieutenant said, the first of their party to speak. Her deep, silky voice easily filled the room despite its perceived softness. The blue lights above her glowed regally on her charcoal skin like exotic dark marble as she reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder, "How are you feeling?"

He felt a timid smile tug at the corner of his mouth all too aware of their eyes which remained affixed to the bandages on his face. He searched for the words, "Well..... my ... eye is ... gone, but the doctor says the damage to the brain was.... well he said it was the best outcome they could have hoped for with an injury like this."

The room fell into an awkward silence. He turned his head to the side in a vain attempt to, at least partially, conceal the injury. He didn't like the way they were staring; he could sense the pity like heat radiating from a fire. It reminded him too much of when he had lost his leg during the war, and that didn't wasn't a memory he was comfortable with.

This tainted atmosphere didn't last, shattered explosively moments later by peals of ruckus laughter. With the awkwardness decapitated, leaving only complete and utter confusion in its wake, the group turned to look for the source of the interruption. Brows furrowed in confusion they found their resident marine grinning from ear to ear fit to burst. Not stopping there, the man cut the space between them and clapped the captain roughly on the arm shaking him until he was legitimately concerned that his remaining eye would go jounce out of his skull and onto the floor. "You glorious bastard," he laughed head tilting back towards the ceiling. "You absolute madman." He stepped back with a grin, "I mean look at you, perfectly fine as beautiful as..... Well, as beautiful as could be expected with a face like yours.

Captain Vir's brows furrowed in consternation, but he didn't have long to think before the man grew serious kneeling next to him to lean in conspiratorially while the other three looked on in bemused confusion, "You know what this means, boy?"

Raising an eyebrow in mild amusement, he humored the marine, "No, what does this mean Sergeant?"

"You're a pirate, a damned space pirate!" He laughed again stepping back to motion to him, "Missing an eye, missing a leg, the captain of a space ship....." He opened his hands wide above his head as if words would appear there in glowing neon, "Space pirate."

His laughter was contagious, and the Captain found a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth ... space pirate, he kind of liked the sound of that.

"And to go along with your new title," the marine announced, "the boys and I got you a little something special."

"Oh?" He wondered aloud glancing over at his other visitors who just shrugged at him apparently unaware of what the marine had planned. The soldier just grinned at them, reaching slowly, and with much ceremony, from behind his back, producing with a grand flourish, a dangling strip of leather, which swayed from his fingers delicately reflecting the blued light cast from above.

"Is that an eyepatch?" The captain exclaimed unsure whether to laugh or to order the marine out of his sight.

"Hell yeah, it's an eyepatch! Who the hell loses an eye and doesn't get an eyepatch? I mean, in my opinion, any one-eyed person who doesn't have one is doing it wrong and seriously needs to reconsider his life choices." The captain just shook his head in bewilderment as the marine grinned at him shiny, leather strip dangling in the air between them. The other three stared at the razor's edge of amusement or awkwardness. It was a pretty presumptuous move on the marine's part, walk in and immediately make light of a man's missing body part and then offer a solution to highlight that exact issue in the most garish way possible.

The way he reacted would potentially shape the way his crew saw him. Not even half a year into their original mission and he had already lost an eye, but then again would accepting this gift make him look better or worse as a Captain?

Just as the moment was beginning to lean towards the awkward, he reached up a hand and motioned to the marine, "Well come on, help a cripple put the damn thing on..... No just take off the bandages, I'm sure it's fine."

He couldn't help but feel the small shock of self-consciousness that rocketed through him as the marine began to unwind the bandages, but he shook it off. He had made his decision, and come hell or high water he was going to see this through.

He felt rather than saw the last bandages come off, and heard the murmur of surprise from around the room.

"Damn!" the marine muttered, "That is one bad ass battle wound.... Here." With a little help from the marine he got the strap over his head, and the patch fitted over the missing eye. He gently shook himself, a little bit like a dog, to settle the strap into place and then looked up, "So, how do I look?"

The three other crew members peered at him with expressions between contemplative to amused. The first lieutenant approved, "It's a good look on you captain.

"Roguish," the linguist commented.

"Definitely getting an edgy, action hero with a tragic backstory vibe," the other nodded.

Honestly, he wasn't entirely sure if they were jesting with him or not. Their straight faces said one thing, but his instincts said another. However, after further deliberation, he made the determination to believe that they were being serious with him, and left the patch on as the marine stepped away nodding.

But there was another issue on his mind now, something he had been wanting to speak to his crew about when they were finally allowed to see him. He glanced towards the doorway, but saw nothing more than a blank grey wall and the glowing blue strip above, "What do you know about the surgeon?"

***

Ok, he was beginning to understand. Dr Krill floated at the center of his office suspended at the singularity of an eclectic constellation of projected medical charts, poorly translated medical journals, and 3D anatomical scans all taken directly from his most recent, and only human subject.

He spun in a slow circle taking in the virtual explosion of information. He hadn't originally planned for this to happen, in fact, it had all started with a simple curiosity regarding the human's visual system that eventually lead him to this little wormhole, but once he had entered, he had been sucked in, like a beam of light caught in the event horizon of a black hole.

He steadied himself and spun in a circle towards the origination. He cast his appendages to the side causing all the projections, but one, to scatter towards the periphery of his visual field where they bunched together in a tightly packed group. The remaining diagram was a scan he had taken, and then refined after significant study. He wanted to begin with something simple, something similar between what he understood and what he did not.

As it turns out, the human nervous system was remarkably similar to the Vrul. The executive cortical structure was housed in the uppermost structure of the body. The human itself had only half as many cortical hemispheres as did the Vrul, and the two hemispheres were extensively interconnected. He couldn't have been sure what that meant for the human, but he highly suspected that they may not have the ability to use each appendage independently as the Vrul did, there would be too much electrical interference between the two sides.

He reached upwards dragging his upper limb through the projection. In response, the shadowy human silhouette spun in a slow circle. It was quite incredible, a featureless simplistic rendering the human body made entirely from the dense fibers of its own nervous system. And though it was the most similar structure of the Vrul, the similarities seemed to end there. The human distribution of the nervous system was wildly uneven, tiny finger like structures erupting from the brain and down into the trunk like a million tiny roots sprouting from the base of a plant and wriggling their way through dark, moist soil. In some areas, these sensory fibers were packed quite densely: the face, the hands, and the groin, and in other places they were almost non-existent: at the joints of the legs, the arms, and at the apex of the forehead.

The structure of the main trunk was significantly more complex than it was in other species, and for the life of him, he couldn't determine its true function. In frustration, he swept his upper limb through the air calling another image forward to overlay itself atop the original.

The second most similar structure to the Vrul was the scaffold, or the skeleton. It was..... alien at best description and diverged wildly from the Vrul despite some passing similarities in general function. The Vrul had a skeletal structure that was much lighter and encased the entire frame from top to bottom keeping all important structures tucked inside, except for weak points where joints allowed their bodies to hinge. The human skeletal structure was..... well it was fragile at best, and downright...... unfortunate at worst.

The skull might have been an acceptable design, but that single piece of decent engineering was negated by the vast swaths of body where the humans just let their organs sort of dangle about in the open. Sure, there was a structure about the chest which acted as a cage of sorts for some of the most vital bits, but the digestive organs were practically ready to fall out of the body cavity and crawl to freedom.

He supposed the spine was acceptable, a well-engineered rod of protective bone that still allowed the human a measure of flexibility that was non-existent in a Vrul. But then again, when a good half unit of your body was supported by nothing more than a column of bone and your squishy innards, it would be difficult not to be a little flexible.

But despite the absolute design disaster that constituted the human body, additional simulations he had run on the interior structure indicated that the bone itself, had a power to weight ratio that made it almost five times stronger than steel, an iron and carbon alloy used for construction on some planets. Disbelieving, he had to run his numbers again, and after the fifth time of receiving the same results, he could only conclude that the science was accurate.

The body of the Vrul sacrificed weight and strength for minimal full coverage of all the internal structures, where the human skeletal system sacrificed coverage for weight and power in the places where it mattered. In fact, it was a simple case of the worst luck that had allowed the human to sustain a brain injury in the first place. Had the point of the rod been driven against any other part of his skull, it may have been deflected away, if the angle was oblique enough.

Doctor Krill was not himself an engineer, but the general structure of the skeletal system was enough to frustrate him to an even greater degree than he had been when examining the nervous system. In a bout of frustration, he selected another overlay over top of the first two as if hoping the additional information would make sense of the mess that sat before him.

Overlay number three happened to be where the human body completely diverged from the structure of a Vrul and gave Doctor Krill quite a surprise. As a consumer based creature, the human had a complicated and energy-consuming system of tubes, organs and fibers that must have required a great deal of energy to run. The Vrul themselves required only the light of the sun, and a reasonable supply of carbon to survive, though to properly maintain their systems they were forced to consume helium from an outside source in order to float. Humans required the 'poisonous' oxygen in order to survive and circulated the gas into the body through a pair of sacks in the chest which provided the liquid supply of vital fluid to the entirety of the body by way of a massive pump inside their chests.

Though the Vrul had no digestive systems, they did use analogous structures to that of the human's lungs and heart. They didn't really resemble the human structures in any meaningful way, but they had a similar function.

While he didn't understand the digestive structures of a human just yet, he found himself marveling at both the lungs and the heart. A Vrul 'heart' needed to beat a few times every minute in order to circulate the proper chemicals about the body, but the human heart was forced to constantly pump vital fluid through a vertical structure, with enough power to shoot blood straight vertically from the feet and back into the chest, which was at least four feet up. The Vrul were generally no more than three feet tall, so circulation wasn't that big of an issue.

As for breathing, that was a great surprise to Krill when he learned that human breathing could be BOTH automatic and manually controlled. In fact, their unique vocalizations required them to have just that ability. If a human really wanted to, they could just ... quit breathing.

In frustration or fascination, he wasn't sure which, he activated the next overlay. He supposed the muscular system DID explain much of why the humans had such a minimal skeletal structure. Where the organs were exposed, a thick fibrous layer of muscle tissue enveloped or encompassed them and the squishy tubes keeping them safe from impact or injury. The muscles were surprisingly strong, and he supposed, if the fibers were flexed during impact, they might be able to stop the interior from being damaged. Of course the Vrul HAD muscle, or something similar to it, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to move around, but compared to the humans, well, there was just no comparison. If his numbers were right, the human could be completely capable of lifting 130% his own weight comfortably, but pushing the skeleto-muscular structure to its max.... 500% its own weight.

With another frustrated wave, the doctor called up the last overlay finally completing these strange sets of biological systems into one single living creation ... the human. This seemingly chaotic and haphazard structure of nervous system and smooth muscle tubing held itself together by way of one last layer, a thin porous casing or membrane patterned with delicate cracks and minute craters like the face of a desert planet's hard packed ground cracked by the heat. The dermis was remarkably flexible, waterproof, but delicate enough that he could SEE the thin tubes of blue spidering through its joints carrying the vital fluid through the body only, naked and exposed.

He floated away from the image as if distance would give him a different perspective, help him to understand this strange creature, like nothing he had ever seen before. The sightless shell stared down at him with its large, wide eyes, and the more it started, the more he was overcome with a visceral feeling of wrongness. He couldn't have said what it was, but there was something ... missing in the image.

Drawn by the desire to explain the feeling, he floated forward across the floor, and adjusted his buoyancy coming face to face with the human's projected image. Looking into its eyes he was gripped by the sudden impression of staring into an abyss, as if he had reached the edge of the universe itself and peered onward into nothingness. The feeling was so gut-wrenching, so absolutely repulsive that he pulled back and ordered the image away upon reflex.

The void-filled eyes blinked out of existence leaving him alone and trembling in his empty office. He released some of the gas and floated back to the floor reaching for something to touch, something to connect him to reality, away from the voidless, nothingness of those staring eyes. This didn't seem right, sure he had been scared of the humans the first time he had seen them, they had been unpredictable entities of uncontrolled emotion and raw power, but they hadn't made him feel so..... so petrified.

He tried to calm his nerves shaking off the fear and berating himself for such silly notions. It was a simple image, nothing more than photons interacting with his eyes, and it held no inherent danger. Yes, he had plenty of reasons to be afraid of the humans, it was an omnivore but also a distinct predator marked as such by its wide, forward-facing eyes. It hadn't attacked him, and despite being the only sentient predator race in the known galaxy, it seemed to be rational creature.

He beat back the absurd fear using logic like a blunt weapon, and with his newfound determination he commanded his research back into place standing amidst a storm of swirling projections as they returned. The human image leapt back to life and then erupted into its separate components far less disconcerting broken down, like how a building could be imposing, but those same architectural plans were just lines.

If he could just...

His lateral antenna buzzed, and the bubbles erupted down his sides in response, "May I come in?" the transmission queried. Recognizing one of his colleagues, he responded in the affirmative and quickly cleared his research to one side of the room as the wall dissolved.

The Vrul floated into the room and was immediately drawn by his jumble of research, "My, you have been busy." The doctor sighed and came to stand next to his colleague, together they looked onward taking in the veritable wall of information.

"I see you haven't managed to shake yourself of this fascination," he stated flatly, reaching out and idly rotating one of the overlays.

"I couldn't let it pass by," the doctor returned feeling a sensation prickle up inside of him. It was a ravenous feeling, like requiring starlight after long hours spent in the dark. "It's like nothing I have ever seen, so strange, quite amazing. These humans, they represent something the galaxy has never seen before. We could learn so much, I can just feel it. I think, if we just had more information, or a little more time-"

"Does the director know about this little side project of yours?" The other cut in turning his back to the research and scuttling across the length of the office to stand before the viewing field. Outside their gas giant hung brightly in the night sky. As bright as it was, there was hardly a need for any artificial light.

The doctor felt himself deflate slightly, enthusiasm draining from the pads of his appendages and onto the cold synthetic. He remained where he stood, "No, I-"

"You have neglected to speak with the director?" the Vrul turned, antenna humming with disapproval, "I hate to be so blunt with you doctor, but it seems to me that sometimes you think because you are the highest ranking surgeon in this field that your actions are above reproach." He walked past the doctor and paused, again, before his research, "You were sent here to do your duty as a Vrul, to fulfill your role as it was intended from the beginning." He rounded on the doctor who stood statue-still in the center of the room, "Don't think your actions haven't already been a cause for concern. First, you leave our homeworld ... intentionally ... without being ordered, which, already strange enough, does not hold a candle to your near constant experimentation, meddling, and pestering. Your involvement with the intergalactic medical community has gone too far."

The doctor felt the exasperation and resentment building up inside him, like air in a bottle under extreme pressure, "My 'involvement' in the medical community is nothing more than completely logical. We cannot just stand by and keep our knowledge from those we have sworn alliance with, and we cannot reject the truths that come from them either."

"That is not your job to determine doctor, it is your job to further your species. This insatiable curiosity of yours is what got you into trouble in the first place. This is why the council has been sent to evaluate you on so many occasions." The two floated across the room away from each other as physically passive as their words were aggressive.

"You need to let this go. You are too concerned with your little experimentations, with your research, and with those papers you are so intent on writing. They are none of your concern. You are only here to fulfill the treaty with the alliance, and once your duty is over you will return to where all our species belongs."

The slight bubbling in his body had now turned to a frantic humming, and as their anger grew, the static only grew worse. "You have my invitation to leave," he asserted stiffly, floating over to hover before his research. Behind him the overlay of the human's skeleton loomed silently, disturbed only by reflected light beaming in from the observation field.

The Vrul held his ground, but suddenly found himself struck with a mild sense of unease. What was it... those projections behind Dr. Krill certainly weren't helping, so alien, so unnatural.

He left the room.

***

Dr. Krill entered the human's room with a modicum of agitation. He wasn't exactly sure what he expected to see, but something inside made him fear he might be forced to confront the depthless, blackness of the image once again.

Off to his side, he could just make out the silhouette of the human shifting and churning in place where it lay. He immediately responded by filtering his vision through a thermal overlay, before immediately scolding himself for it and shutting it back off. Not only was the human unbearably bright with shedding heat, but there was no reason for him to feel so paranoid, it wasn't logical.

Floating forward into the room he forced himself to look at the human directly. From this distance, he couldn't resolve all of the features, but could see that the creature was baring its teeth at him. He froze where he stood, rooted to the ground by his own gut wrenching fear. It cemented him to where he stood, burrowed into his skin and spread like an insidious disease up his limbs. Had they neglected to feed it, was its insatiable lust for sustenance and hunger becoming too great for it to bear; had its animal mind taken over its rational mind?

Was it going to attack him?

"Um..... hey doc ... are you ok?" The seemingly innocuous question startled him from his reverie more forcibly than rationality of any kind could have managed, and he oscillated confusedly at the center of the room. The human sat up, powerful dorsal muscles holding him upright. His teeth weren't barred anymore as he leaned forward spine collapsing in a way that looked almost painful, nearly folded in half at the waist. He waved a hand in the air, "Hello, Earth to E.T is anyone home."

"What?"

The human exhaled a sudden burst of air, "Never mind, I'm just wondering if you're alright. For a second there it looked like you were going to cut and run."

"I.... do not understand," Krill ventured, inching tentatively closer.

"Mother of Jupiter," he trailed off lamely. "You look scared, are you ok?"

Oh, if that is what it had been trying to say all along it should have just gone and said it, though the fact that the human could sense his unease was cause for great concern. Could it smell his fear? Perhaps it could sense the chemical changes in his body.

"Do you often show your teeth?" he ventured, tentatively scooting a little closer.

The human blinked, "Show my teeth? I.... uh.... OH! No, that, that's different. Uh" The human paused rubbing his chin thoughtfully. In the past few days, a light dusting of hair had erupted from the creature's skin stopping and starting in the strangest of places. As he rubbed, a strange scratching sound emanated from his hands, "Like this?" spikes of bone passed into view glistening with a light coating of saliva glittering with the calming blue lights, now eerie upon examination.

Kril backed away.

The human waved a hand wildly, "Calm down doc, can you not smile on your planet?"

"Smile?"

The human did something strange with its single eye flashing the sclera at him momentarily as the iris rolled towards the top of the head, "Yeah, a smile, you know a way of greeting someone, being polite?" he waited for a second, and when the doctor just stood confused, he sighed. "Humans smile at each other to greet people we like, like friends, or to show that we are happy. I am greeting you."

"Friends?" the Vrul ventured. He had a fleeting understanding of the concept. He had heard a similar word used by the Tesraki, and the Rundi and knew it had something to do with a close social bond.

"Yeah, friends. You saved my life after all, so it seemed the logical progression, don't you think?"

Krill just shook his head. It didn't seem particularly logical to him, but the human was strange, and much was still unknown about its behavior. To show amiability or harmlessness the humans showed their bone protrusions; interesting, in a backward way

"Look, if you're worried about the teeth thing, I'll stop, but just so you know the difference between good and bad expressions I would be happy to give a quick demonstration" The human paused and lowered his chin over the generally unprotected front of his neck. That was followed by his lips slow withdrawal across the slimy landscape of those bone protrusions. It was a similar expression to the one before it, but this one covered the neck, showed more teeth, and the way the brows cut across the eyes convinced the doctor that it would be quite prudent to make a hasty retreat.

"Wow, hey, it was just a demonstration, I'm not going to eat you..... At least not yet..... KIDDING! Jeez, doesn't your species have a sense of humor?" Krill's antenna hummed disapprovingly.

The human shook its large head, "I'll take that as a no. Promise, humans don't eat aliens."

The doctor wasn't sure if he believed that, but the human was smiling at him again, and he had to admit that the expression was significantly less distressing than he had originally supposed especially when compared to the second. So he made an executive decision and hesitantly approached to begin his examination. At first, he tried everything he could to avoid looking the human in the eye, though it wasn't lost on him that that decision wasn't really an option considering the location of the human's latest wound. Still, he stalled for as long as it seemed feasible before finally forcing himself to do what needed to be done.

When he did, he found himself immediately overcome with an immense sense of relief, though he couldn't have said why. The eye appeared much the same as it had in the projected image, a delicately striated lattice of pigment of a delicate forest green surrounding a contracting and expanding aperture of deep blackness. However, the inscrutable void from earlier was nowhere to be seen. Not that that particular turn of phrase made sense either, as far as the doctor could tell, there was nothing visually different between the image and the real eye. Rather than an actual physical change, it seemed to be the feelings the two evoked. Rather than staring into an endless abyss, he was filled with a sudden sense of life and warmth. There was nothing there to indicate such feelings ... but he was distinctly aware or assured that this creature was...alive, vibrant...and no matter how he tried to verbalize the feeling it gave him there was no way of explaining it.

Despite his relief, he was very displeased to find that his bandages had been tampered with and an unsterilized item had been brought in contact with the wound. He scolded the human for what must have been a good two cycles, but his warnings either could not seem to keep the creature's attention or he simply didn't care, and the doctor wasn't sure whether to be frustrated or fascinated by the reaction

Otherwise the human was significantly more active than he had been those first few days after injury. He was also extremely talkative; most of what he said had no particular meaning to Krill. Despite having access to a complete translation algorithm of the human language, he suspected that the creatures used many words that didn't exist on his planet, and when he did use words that Krill understood he used them in ways that seemed contrary to their true meaning or were translated into downright nonsense.

Occasionally, the human would look at him as if waiting for a reaction only to flash another strange human expression, characterized by a sharp downturn at the corners of the mouth. Krill tried to fight down his fascination and keep his interaction with the human strictly professional, but the more he interacted the more the fascination grew until he simply couldn't contain himself, and he heard himself, as if from a distance, cut off the human and began asking his own questions. Where were they from? What was their climate like? What was the point of the fur on parts of their body but not everywhere? Did all humans have this coloring?

He stopped when he realized the human was smiling at him again. The delicate line of fur above the human's eye raised, a surprising feat of dexterity, the muscles in the face must have been so complex!

"I'm afraid those aren't questions I can answer doctor."

The doctor hummed in displeasure, "Why not?"

The smile didn't waver. It didn't make sense in context, he thought that humans smile to greet each other but they had been in the same room for almost 15 cycles now.

The human lifted its shoulders before slowly dropping them back, "I just can't because although I can give you some answers there are just some things you have to see and experience for yourself."

"Figure it out for myself?" the doctor wondered, "and how would I be expected to do that?"

The human sighed deeply, "Unfortunately, I have no idea. I mean, but no you wouldn't be interested in that. Never mind, I am sure you wouldn't be able to handle it. Far above your skill level."

The doctor had the sudden sensation that the human was goading him, though he couldn't have said why he thought that, and if that was the case, he was infuriated to find that it was working! "I very much doubt that human." he found himself retorting with more indignation than he really intended.

The smile grew bigger, more teeth, "Well doctor, my ship's medical officer recently left under some unusual circumstances, and I have no one to look over the crew, but you hadn't even done brain surgery until two days ago so while we need a new medical officer you are certainly not qualified, and there is no way you would be able to handle a human ship."


	14. Chapter 14

Theoretically, a human can survive in the vacuum of space for approximately 15 seconds before passing out from oxygen loss through the blood. 

This fact assumes that the human has evacuated all the air from their lungs PRIOR to exposure to vacuum conditions

-

The planet of Anum glowed through the darkness as the light of its inner, volcanic core radiated from thin rivulets of molten stone like cracks on the face of a porcelain doll. These rivers of fire kept their steady course as they had for millions of years building stone upon stone, destruction giving way to rebirth, creating lands of fertile soil along its fiery rivers and banks. The course of the molten rivers had not shifted in millions of years but for the slow buildup of igneous rock, which had allowed life to flourish since the beginning. The planet's atmosphere, blocked by tons of volcanic ash, was surprisingly cool despite its close approximation to its star leaving Anum's climate temperate and comfortable.

A mate of twin moons revolved about the planet stabilizing its upright axis. Each longitudinal band towards the poles of the planet grew colder, and would have left nothing but a fertile band round the middle habitable, if it were not for the volcanic activity, which not only protected the planet from the sun's heat, but also locked in heat from volcanic activity towards the poles. The carbon rich atmosphere and fertile soil allowed plant-life to flourish. From space, the planet was a green, magenta and orange marble cut with large splotches of black and red fire like a patch of diseased skin atop an otherwise pristine body. Pools of cool turquoise blue blended with the colorful fauna adding a sort of tranquility to an otherwise busy and fiery surface.

On the dark side of the planet, all colors were eliminated leaving not but a fiery red, and a luminous blue, from an increased sulfur glow from its rivers of fire. Beyond that, if a ship were to draw closer, it would make out a constellation of tiny lights marking the isolated civilizations jealously guarding their borders. And right in the center of this, on the horizontal line of the equator glowed a spot brighter than all others surrounded on all sides, by hundreds of smaller satellite pinpricks.

The city held no more than five hundred inhabitants, a cluster of short single-room dwellings set like the spokes of a wheel around a large central cathedral hewn from the rough volcanic stone. Despite the primitive, almost tribal nature of the houses and the surrounding land, hints of an advanced society lingered just out of sight in the strange, unnatural blueness of the light emanating from the dwellings, devoid of the red flickering of fires. Despite that, the ground was not but rough stone and soft moss; which carpeted the interior of most houses with a thick purple layer.

Tall figures stood about the edge of the village just within sight of each other as they stared outwards into night. Their bodies were regal and war-like standing from seven to ten feet tall. They had six limbs all together, with powerful back legs to hold themselves upright, with a construction similar to that of a satyr, or perhaps the popular imaginings of a werewolf. But instead of hooves or claws, their feet were divided into two sturdy toes which could flex and bend to support themselves over rough ground. The curve of their backs flowed into powerful shoulders, and two sets of arms, one pair sitting higher than the other as if they were stacked. The upper pair of arms extended to the upper mid thigh while the second pair of arms tended to be slightly shorter and thinner. Each of their four hands was topped by three long claws one bending like a thumb and the other two acting as normal fingers. Their necks were thick and powerful curving upwards into a head that was faintly reminiscent of a bird of prey with sharp, forward, eyes and a snout which curved sharply in to resemble a beak.

Each and every creature was covered in a rigid carapace of shiny, colorful plates glittering metallic in the distant blue light. This armor-like substance covered the upper part of the head and beak, chest, shoulders, upper thighs, hips, forearms, and parts of their feet. This carapace was thickest about their chests, and completely absent in places that would require flexibility; joints, trunks, necks, and hands respectively. The carapace itself was shiny and metallic like the glossy paint finish on a newly purchased car, or the shell of a scarab beetle. Though they wore no clothing as would have been the understanding of man, they did adorn themselves in thick, plated armor where their own natural armor was lacking. The metal used to make the armor was thick, and held on by strange fibrous straps.

However, the metal working itself was not primitive but smelted and carved as it was into intricate patterns and interlocking designs that belied its strength with beauty. Thin veins of blue light seeped through cracks in the armor hinting at more advanced methods of protection than would have been assumed. Their weapons were similarly made, intricate staffs, obsidian edged weapons, and other creations molded from fire, steel and stone, but interlaced with glowing cells of power.

As the night drew on, the sky above glowed with the distant luminance of the fiery mountains. The watch was still, until a disturbance on the far end of the village broke the chain, and two of the warriors turned aside weapons thudding into soft moss as they saluted an approaching figure.

She was tall, a creature of immense power, and to the others, stunning beauty. Compared to the average human, she rose over nine feet tall and had a carapace that glittered with uneven purple tones like nebulae from the glittering sky above.

The two guards lowered their heads in deference to their matriarch, second to the Reconciler of the Cathedral, and their leader in war. "General," one of them murmured, voice carried softly through the night.

In that moment between words, there was nothing but the distant huffing of the volcanoes roaring at the edge of hearing.

"Footmen," she acknowledged. Even in the silence, in her softest voice, the words were still harsh like the crack of an unseen whip, the two guards flinched before her bowing in deference.

A warm night breeze blew past them on its way from the volcano bringing with it the distant smell of sulfur. "Keep watching with the night," she commanded in a soft voice, "for it will be long." Sensing something strange on the air, the soldiers suddenly noted her lack of armor, which was unusual, but the subtle thickening about her trunk attested to the truth, and with greater difference than before, they backed away allowing her to pass softly into the night soon to vanish into the darkness.

The sky above her was cold and distant, casting the light of two waning moons down upon her as she trekked over the soft moss and volcanic stone, a single figure highlighted against the inky void. Somewhere above a shooting star cut into the atmosphere before burning up and vanishing as if it had never existed. The distant purple and blues of their neighboring nebulae glowed like a sentient eye watching from the blackness of space and staring down at her as her feet made soft trails over dust and fallen ash as she drew closer and closer to the edge of the volcanic lands.

She wore no armor to protect her from the dangers of the volcanic lands. This was not the time for armor, and by tradition, she would not reject the customs of her ancestors.

For the greater part of the journey, she walked without ceasing her back straight and her head held high, but the further she went, her legs straining to climb the low-lying hills just before the fiery border, the more she slowed, stopping at times as roiling, jagged pains nearly brought her to her knees. But despite her pain, she kept climbing and clawing her way up and over jagged stone. The heat grew more intense as she grew closer to the fire, finally coming to a stop bathed in the glow of the firelight. The pain radiating in rhythmic time. Trying to stave off the agony as long as she could, she walked in a circle curling over every now and again keening, sweating and gasping.

Suddenly she found herself on her knees back arched with the pain. She felt her breath being stolen from her as the agony increased exponentially. She drew in a great heaving breath and screamed towards the sky in agony, her war cry turned birthing trying to release the pain. Alone under the sky left to live or die as the spirits would will it. If she was strong she would make it through, if the kit was strong it would make it through, if they were both strong both would make it through. She screamed again clawing at the stone beneath her fingers, her voice powerful enough to match the roaring of the fire which now bathed her in blistering heat. She arched forward panting for air.

Never had she known a pain so great in all her battles, but once many years ago. For what felt like hours, she fought a solitary battle for two lives under a distant observant sky above and a frenzied fire to her side.

With one last scream that threatened to tear her throat asunder, she was released from her pain as she knelt on the blazing stone arms and legs trembling uncontrollably from her extended effort. She closed her eyes anxiously waiting, and was rewarded almost immediately by a soft sound barely audible over the roaring of the fire.

General Cosma reached down, large hand cupping around the slight creature's middle bringing it forward for proper examination.

What she saw made her sick with horror.

The tiny, mucousy creature wriggled and swayed blindly in her hands, its exposed greying skin tinted a light pink. Its tiny eyes were shut tight, and its delicate little beak opened and closed in admonishment, its cries unheard over the roaring of the fire as its limbs waved sporadically. What carapace it had, as young as it was, was a delicate powder blue, reflecting the orange of the nearby fire soft.

But that was not the problem...... the problem was the kit's size. It was less than two feet in length, a tiny thing.

A runt.

Cosma felt her insides go cold despite the fire that warmed her skin. She stared at the tiny creature in her arms as it kicked and struggled.

Legacy and heritage had spoken to her so far.

Custom and culture had brought her alone into the hills to allow the spirits to guide her fate: she would be strong and survive, the kit too would be strong and survive or she and/or the kit would be lost, and she would come back defeated, but this, this could not have been worse. Tradition said only one thing about this... only the strong could survive, only the strong could be allowed to continue onwards, it was for the survival of the tribe, the improvement of their genetics, the advancement of their race.

This kit could not be allowed to live, lest she be a burden to the tribe. General Cosma stepped towards the edge of the fiery precipice holding the tiny kit in her arms as it struggled for life, crying out against the super-heated updraft that washed over them. The fire below was deafening and scorching.

She held the kit forward staring down at the molten river below her.

She had to do it, it's what was expected over her.

With one last effort, she reached out, and....

No, she could not do it. She couldn't. With a cry of despair, she stumbled away from the edge of the cliff and fell to her knees on the feverish stone. The kit continued to whimpered in her arms. It was a beautiful face, a perfect female despite its size.

She clutched the kit to her chest, "Why couldn't you have been bigger?" she anguished nearly choking on her own grief, rocking absently back and forth against the stone not caring about her own pain. She sat there for minutes rocking, holding the kit against her chest feeling it squirm and wriggle, but then she looked down and its size repulsed her.

She got back to her feet stumbling towards the edge. She held out her arms once more hands trembling. They loosened and she... let go...

NO!

She snatched the body from the air, and then not looking back she fled from the edge and was halfway down the hill before she fell, again, to her knees racked with the torment of what she had almost done and with what she was now doing. She could hear the kit's cry now, a high pitched keening that was surprisingly strong despite the size. She looked down at the tiny face, and grasping hands. How could she do it, this was her blood, this was... this was what she had wanted. All the others of her age and status had at least six to seven in a warring brood by now. However, after her first, now a strong and perfect child, her and her mate had struggled and failed time after time to produce a second. She had lost many, carried some almost to term before her body rejected them. She felt her back bowed under a mental pain that could not be rivaled even by the pain of birth.

She had to sacrifice it, had to give it back to the spirits allowing it to be recycled back into the circle so that it might come back stronger. She had done everything for this tribe, she had conquered the ten warring tribes of the east and forced them into submission. She had lead their armies south and north in a campaign of conquest and domination that brought them the most fertile lands, and the largest holdings, how could she be cursed with an inability to produce young, it didn't seem fair.

Why had the Gods ignored her efforts? After all she had done, how could they expect her to give this up?

She screamed at the sky, at the ever-watching-eye which glowered down upon her from the heavens, and the kit screamed with her. The power in its lungs made her question tradition and custom. It was strong perhaps, its size would not matter. A small child was hardly a problem if it could grow and develop into a strong warrior. In fact, aside from its size it was completely whole, there were no deformities or defects that should stop it from growing to be a strong warrior just like her mother or her father.

General Cosma sat on the rocks, her body aching like a fading ember compared to the agony in her soul. She knew what her options were, she knew what she SHOULD do, but she just... couldn't. Didn't she deserve to make this decision after all she had done for her people? Didn't she deserve to keep her own kit?

The kit's crying grew strong and unwavering. If she closed her eyes she could almost imagine a lanky, substantial kit.

...

How would it feel the moments before its death as its body was suffocated by heat and consumed by fire?

With that thought, she was overcome with revulsion and stumbled away from the rock, away from the fire, away from the thoughts that engulfed her. The inner struggle consumed her, and she held the kit even closer muttering a string of nonsense to herself as well as to the tiny form in her arms. "Why.... why couldn't you just be bigger? Why...why... why did this happen to me... why?" But with every step, and with every word she was taken further from the fire.

"Why do the spirits curse us so?"

It would have been better if she had lost the offspring, better if it had been born unbreathing and blue, better even if it had been born deformed so that she would feel no issue in casting it into the fire and back to the spirits, more out of mercy than disgust.

But no, she was given the worst possible outcome, a perfect child who others would yet see as a burden, a deformity. This time her cry was not one of war but of sadness and pain. She knew what was to come for her daughter's future, knew how hard life would be, but still she could not return to the fire, could not imagine that blazing heat and did not want to.

Perhaps the child would yet grow, perhaps all her agony would be for nothing. She could make up for the suffering by turning her flawed kit into the best warrior that the clan had ever seen. Yes, yes that would make up for what she had done, that would ease her guilt and prove that she was not weak.

She wasn't weak, she hadn't let the child live because of her own selfish desire, or inability to do what needed to be done, no, she had let the child live because she saw the potential only a mother could see. In time they would understand, and in time her own guilt would be washed away like rainwater washes blood from the battlefield.

The figure came trudging back into the village just as dawn was breaking over the western horizon, for their planet spun clockwise. The guards stirred and lifted their weapons squinting through the early morning mist made by cloud and ash. As the figure resolved itself, the guards fell back and allowed the general to pass through their ranks. A few of them rumbled deep in their chests as she passed, a sound of celebration for her triumph, but despite their calls, the figure did not speak, hurrying instead through the lines of low buildings arms clenched tightly around a still, silent form.

The small, austere house occupied a place at the center of the city just across from the wide, dark doors of the cathedral. Under the distant covering of ash and cloud, their star was tinted red, casting the land in a bloody haze. It would be a poor day for war or even for training, but still the early morning grew with sounds as the soldiers took to their marching. Standing just outside in the early morning light, General Luminous gazed west.

He held firm against the coming morning as red light from the rising sun shattered off his golden carapace and went spilling down his skin; covering him from head to toe in ruby facets.

He wore no armor, for that would not do as today he would take on a completely different battle. Despite his nerves, he held his head high and made no show of the worry that plagued his heart. Somehow, he felt this would be their last chance. If they could not produce a viable offspring this time, then they never would. A quick glance to the south brought thoughts of their only son, surely out training in the early morning mist.

Their first attempt had been a wild success and seemed to hint at greater things to come, for the boy was exceptionally strong and proud like his parents, and was quickly becoming one of the greatest warriors of his generation. But barren years passed and nothing but fruitless attempts, leaving the two of them wondering what scheme the Gods were conjuring. A strong brood was a sign of a strong battle pair, and yet they had none.

His nerves rose with the sun, and he began to wonder if his mate would ever return from her lonely venture to the volcanic edge, but even as he conjured that thought a shadow passed through the mist and resolved into a tall-dazzling form. Though he could sense the exhaustion in her step, she walked with all the pride of a true warrior.

But no... something was wrong.

The confidence of her body lied when the expression on her face manifested itself, which was dark. Frantic with desperation, he looked for any sign of a newborn kit puzzled when he did indeed see his mate holding something.

She stalked forward from the fog refusing to make eye contact with him as she shoved something into his arms and then stepped inside shutting the door behind her with a soft thud. He looked after her with confusion and deep concern. He took a step to follow, but was caught off guard by a quiet chirp. He paused with his foot mid-air looking down to find a tiny face staring up at him, and for a moment his heart seemed to soar; the tiny kit was alive, and it had survived the journey home.

And then he saw the problem, and felt the problem.

She was so, so small.

Glancing towards the closed door he knew what had happened. He was not sure how it had happened, and hadn't been sure to this moment that it was entirely possible.

Cosma had not followed the traditions, she had not done what thousands of years dictated that she do.

And he couldn't blame her.

Looking down at the undersized kit curled in his arms he knew that he wouldn't have been able to do it either. Tenderly, he reached out a finger tracing a claw tip down the tiny cheek. She was perfect if you discounted the size, perhaps she would grow, and even if she didn't who was to say she would not be a good warrior. No one had ever tried it, so how were they to know it was impossible.

The tiny creature opened its mouth, and chirped at him as if it could hear what he was thinking. Lifting his regal head to the sky he contemplated the horizon. He would find a proper name for her, as was his want and his right as the male half of his battle pair. As was his duty, he would take care of her until she was old enough to train, he would feed her, he would teach her, and with only his knowledge he would name her.

Something traditional he though, something to invoke the power of the spirits that watched over them.

The clouds parted above, and a beam of light cut down to spear into the outlying land its golden light glittering through particles of ash.

Softly, in his most reverent whisper he said, "And may this name invoke in you the strength of the sun spirit itself.... Sunny.

***

"Have your senses completely left you, Surgeon?"

The Trauma Center's chief director and Dr. Krill's acting superior paced around his office in a frantic tizzy as Dr Krill stood quietly by the viewing field staring out at the distant grey sky. Despite a covering of atmospheric haze, their neighboring gas giant could be seen as a large crescent scar of hazy white against the soft grey backdrop.

"Are you even paying attention?" his superior demanded. At this point the Gibb had worked himself up to a near conniption, voice rising to decibel levels that many other species would have found difficult to make out, but despite his superior's raised voice, the doctor simply turned a calm eye upon the Gibb as he hopped about in a frenzy.

The Gibb species was a distant galactic cousin of the Vrul. In certain parts of the galaxy, where similar circumstances had spawned similar planets, sentient lifeforms sprang up which tended to mirror each other in form and figure.

In this case, the Gibb hailed from a planet only two solar systems over and were about the same height as the Vrul with a similar shape including four spidery limbs, a long torso, and a rather bulbous head. However they did lack the requisite extra set of upper appendages, and he had three more eyes than Dr. Krill thought absolutely necessary.

However, unlike the Vrul, the Gibb were known for their distinctive temperaments, prone to nervous dispositions and commonly afflicted with imperfections of the mind causing delusions and hallucinations. In addition, they tended to have a pension for monologuing. For this reason, the doctor hadn't even bothered speaking past his original announcement.

"Do you understand what this will do to us? I am of the mind to call your council members since, clearly, you aren't of the right mind, though the rings of Nebulon know we have suspected that for a while now. Always with the strange behavior Dr. Krill, always forcing the hand of your superiors, always poking into business that is not yours. Tell me, how long has it been since you returned to your home planet, perhaps the time away from home has dulled your reasoning?"

Dr. Krill had always assumed he had possessed an immense well of patience, and he had also assumed that many hours of quiet, patient study to become a doctor would equate to being able to quietly sit and listen. However, he was beginning to discover that he was not, in fact, patient when it came to listening to useless, pointless, bumbling idiocy.

"I assure you, Director," he cut in forcibly, "I have made my decision logically. The universe has been lacking in scientific discovery over the past few cycles. Advancement in the field of medical science has all but ground to a halt, an issue that troubles me immensely. The humans-"

"Enough! Enough with the HUMANS, Surgeon. You have done your duty for them, completed your involvement. Your job was to fix the creature and then send it off, not to put it under a microscope and study it. The galactic community has no need for human medical science. They are a primitive species which has only just evolved the ability to travel the cosmos. There is nothing they could teach us that we do not already know, and you have already proven that our current information is more than enough to perform the necessary procedures to keep the creatures alive."

The doctor's antenna hummed in barely controlled anger, "Those are the thoughts of an ignorant and pompous species. These 'creatures' are remarkable, and you would understand that if you had simply taken the time to read my medical report. The creature had a metal rod sticking out of his brain! The only other time I have ever seen equivalent injuries the patient was in the morgue. No species in the known galaxy has the capability to survive a brain injury much less walk itself into the medical bay and speak with me like a sentient lifeform while doing so Furthermore-" he was forced to raise his voice in an effort to keep above the protesting director who had now moved forward in a more confrontational manner. "Furthermore, any opportunity we have to learn from this creature should be taken with all due haste. Can you imagine what we could accomplish if we had the knowledge to perform work on cortical tissue?"

"Impossible!" The director began only to be cut off once more as Krill stepped in.

"I would have said the same thing until a few days ago, but now that I have ACTUALLY performed a cortical procedure you cannot deny it's truth. These humans may well be the gateway into a new era of medical science, and it would be irresponsible of us to ignore that fact as we would be doing a disservice to the medical community and to all the lives it might save."

The director spun in an exasperated circle throwing his limbs up into the air in a demonstration of his extreme frustration. "Perhaps, one might be willing to believe your story, but the fact of the matter is you are NOT doing this for the medical community." The two of them were standing across from each other now separated by an ever decreasing number of body lengths in a demonstration of unusual aggression for either of their races. "The reason," the Director continued, "the reason you are so interested in humans has nothing to do with the medical community and everything to do with your insatiable need to show off, and your selfish disregard for your proper place. You want this out of pure curiosity even to the detriment of your own species."

Doctor Krill grew very still even though the incessant humming of his lateral antenna filled his head. But like his race the anger did not spill over into his actions, as it was not logical, but came out in his words. He did not attempt to argue, the Gibb weren't known for their tendency to change their mind once it had been made.

There was only one thing to do, "If that is the way you feel, Director, then I am afraid I will have to tender my resignation effective immediately, and hope that I find a place of work that is more appreciative of both my curiosity and my desire to do some good in this universe."

The wall melded closed behind him, but the voice of the director did not abate as he had followed Krill from the office with a shriek of protest and the frantic waving of his upper limbs.

"You cannot do this! This is madness! You have lost your mind! Did you even think this through?" The questions continued to spill forth, as the two of them came around the next corner breaking through a group of medical assistants who followed their continual progress down the hall with curious eyes.

"You demonstrate your ignorance of me by asking that question," the doctor snapped sharply. The Director nearly ran himself into a wall as they cut sharply around another corner. "I thought about this for many hours, I weighed the pros and cons, I made lists, I ran statistics, and I have found the losses that you would take in my absence to be acceptable when weighed against the pros of leaving. In fact, my value to you does not come in my skill alone, but the speed at which I work. If you were to hire three more doctors in my absence, you would see no great cost, and if they are Vrul, you need not worry about monetary compensation. Furthermore, the skill at which I work is useless here seeing as all those procedures which only I can perform are only useful in one in every thousand instances because the injury that accompanies it usually results in immediate death. So in short, and with all due honesty, despite how egoistic it may seem, my skills surpass this center's need. There are hundreds of other doctors who can do my job, and a few of them who would do it for the duty of their species rather than monetary compensation."

Unfortunately, instead of understanding this logic the director only seemed to become more infuriated by his words. Stepping outside under the light of a murky orange sky cast by the setting sun, the director was nearly hopping with rage. "You selfish, incorrigible, egocentric, delusional-" At this point, his ranting had attracted a small crowd of eyes, as medical assistants, and other doctors on their breaks turned to see the cause of the commotion.

Observing this, the director attempted to lower his voice, but the damage had already been done. At this range there were some species that would be able to pick up the radio signals shed from their conversation. "How dare you suggest such things. You would throw away the primary core of your species to go chasing after a dream, and as for the rest of your claims. How dare you!" he repeated quite fruitlessly.

Dr. Krill stood quietly, silently resting the flats of his upper appendages against each other, looking vaguely reminiscent of a praying mantis at that moment, unemotional, and waiting patiently to emotionally destroy this creature when the chance arose.

"You would force three of your kin to LEAVE their planet to replace you, so that you can go galavanting across space trying to be some sort of hero. What kind of Vrul even WANTS to leave his planet?"

Dr. Krill felt nothing at the words, though, of course, there was a part of him that knew the Gibb was right. Though the Vrul were part of the Galactic Assembly, and so bound by duty to participate and assist in the affairs of the known universe, their primary duty was, and would always be, to the furtherment of their own species. Most of the Vrul only ever left their world on the command of the council in order to fulfill the agreement that they had made with the assembly. However, after years of practicing medicine on his own planet, where virtually all disease was eradicated, and Vrul subjects were generally too cautious to get injured, Krill had requested to leave.

At the time, it had caused a big issue. No one was sure if he was allowed to put in for his own transfer, since no one had ever done it before, and no one had wanted to, until him. Eventually he had convinced the council to let him go based on his previous medical experience and the state of the rest of the galaxy when it came to current medical technology. Since then he had passed up a score of opportunities to return home, and the council had been more than vocal about their worry for him.

He took his time coming up with a response allowing the Director to stew in his own nerves. "I reject the basic illogical nature of my supposedly logical race. They think intergalactic relations will be held together based on the lowest common denominator. That, somehow, if we do as little as possible then peace will naturally prevail. I disagree." He turned to look up at their fading star and the slowly brightening sky above illuminated mostly by the gargantuan glowing disk of their neighboring gas giant. "Besides," he pointed out softly, "If I am so strange, then wouldn't it make sense to send me away from home where I will not cause issue."

He would have liked to walk away leaving the Gibb in stunned silence, but stunned silence wasn't exactly a Gibb's strong suit. He lifted his arms towards the cosmos as if admonishing the stars themselves to fall from the sky and convince the doctor of how irrational he was being. "You leave me no choice, Doctor, I am sending you back home effective immediately for your health. Clearly, we have been ignoring these problems for too long."

The doctor remained calm although under the surface he was feeling annoyance begin to bubble up. "You have no such power here, and you seem to have forgotten that. But let me make this clear, concise and incontestable. I quit." He held up a hand, "and don't even bother trying to change my mind. I just had my assistant transmit my resignation to the council directly. If they have an issue they are more than welcome to take it up with me directly."

He let his lateral antenna vibrate with a short radio burst, and before the director could continue his argument the doctor had boarded a rail transport, and was then shooting across the open square and towards the medical bay growing ever further away from administration, leaving the Gibb standing stunned within a ring of shocked onlookers.

Dr. Krill was only now beginning to feel the implications of his actions. Of course, his decision wasn't just spur of the moment. He had spent days researching, speaking with other scientists, contacting old friends, and most of all exploring all the arguments, pros and cons, for and against what he was about to do, and there seemed to be no question that more good would come of this than bad. The absence of a single doctor would do nothing to the medical staff at the trauma center. Furthermore, they hadn't missed his absence back on his home planet, so they were unlikely to miss it now.

In fact, the only cons that he had been able to list were all personal in nature. Including, the likelihood of not being able to go home again, issues with the council, being stuck on an alien ship without his own kind to keep company, and a host of unnamed dangers that could come with what he was about to do. It was this last con that gave him the most pause. As a rule, the Vrul as a species were not known for their risk taking behaviors. In fact, it was quite safe to say that they DIDN'T take risks at all. So alien was the idea of physical risk taking that when they joined the Galactic Alliance they had been stunned to learn about the idea of war, and upon learning what it meant, refused to have anything to do with it.

That simple fact was the main reason you would not have seen a Vrul involved in the recent Drev war. The second reason was that Vrul were not known for traveling too far from their home planet, located in the Duoinspira (Andromeda) whereas the Drev war took place in the Quadinspira (Milkyway Galaxy).

If he were to do what he planned on doing...Well it was highly likely he would permanently ostracize himself from his species in the most spectacular way possible. He would, all at once, ignore the council, separate himself from his species, and go traveling far from home.

It would be the end of his life as he knew it, and it would likely be the biggest risk a Vrul had ever taken.

The wall ahead of him melted backwards to reveal the dark, isolated interior of the patient room. Blue strips of light gave a sort of ambient silence to the room, designed specifically to induce sleep, and healing in certain species.

The human was there, as before, lying on his back with his hand held in front of him flexing and unflexing examining it as if he had just become aware of the appendage. However, as soon as Krill stepped into the room, the hand dropped and the human sat up. The bodily expression which he took was unknown to Krill but included a sudden relaxational drop in the shoulders and a tilted head. The mouth opened to breathe a sigh, and the eyebrows raised slightly. The unknown expression immediately morphed into a "smile" as the human had called it.

"Morning Doc," the human greeted, though Krill didn't entirely understand the phrase. He had a feeling that the human was short-phrasing, a linguistic term created by those who created the translation equipment, describing a phrase that cut out sounds or words making it impossible for the simple translation algorithms to detect. Of course, the algorithm would adapt over time, but he hadn't spent nearly enough time with the strange creatures.

However, he may not have known humans for very long, but he did know they were infuriatingly bad at speaking clearly.

The humans face dropped a bit, mouth making an oh in realization before starting again, "Good Morning, Doctor."

"Is it?" Krill wondered absently floating forward to begin removing sensors and tubes from the human's exposed skin.

The human tilted its large head towards him, single eye blinking unnervingly at him, "What are you doing?"

The doctor stepped back with the last sensor, and turned to shut off the machines, "You want to go back to your ship don't you?"

In response, the human sat up throwing his legs over the side of the bed and rubbing his arm. "Hell yeah, of course I do. I'm bored out of my mind, and if this goes any longer I may just ascend and allow my mind to meld into the ether."

"What?"

"What?"

"Nevermind," the doctor said scuttling around the side of the bed and towards the wall. At his command, a compartment opened, revealing a stack of the human's effects all strange and unknowable to Krill.

The human had stood now, peering over him with his single eye, "Hey!" he exclaimed stepping forward. "No one told me my things were here, that would have been GREAT to know like five days ago when I WASN'T bored out of my mind." The human moved forward, reaching for his things, but Krill stopped him in his tracks diverting the human's attention back down to himself.

"No, you can have your things back and you can even leave, but ONLY after you have done something for me."

The human stood, towering over Krill by almost three feet. One of the little furry lines above his eyes rose, and he crossed his arms over his chest. Krill wasn't sure what to make of the gesture. It didn't seem self-protecting in nature, seeing as the ribcage protected the chest, but the way the muscle moved to fall into place made sure to highlight the heavy muscles in the forearms and biceps.

Could it be issuing a challenge?

The human shifted his weight onto one foot, leaving himself intentionally off balance....

"Alright, what do you want?" a strange glint appeared in the human's eye. Krill couldn't have explained how, the only thing the eye could do was contract, expand, or move a bit, but somehow the strange expression still remained.

"You want out of here, and so do I. You take me onto your ship as your primary medical officer, and we both get what we want." The doctor tapped one of his four feet thoughtfully on the floor below, "In fact, I think this is an excellent bargain for you seeing as you seem to get more out of it than I."

The humans cheek twitched slightly dragging the right side of his mouth up for an instant while that single eye remained cocked in it's earlier position. "Oh really?" He paused thoughtfully, corners of his mouth dragging down into a downward 'smile,' "You know... It may seem that way to you, but honestly, I'm not so sure."

Krill felt his nerves bubbling up inside of him. Had he read the human wrong? Had he made a mistaken judgement?

The human rubbed the back of his neck ponderously, "I mean, until five days ago you had never even performed brain surgery, so I mean, I'm not entirely sure you can handle a human crew." The gleam in the human's eyes exploded, dancing like a small flame. The corners of his mouth twitched sporadically as he spoke, as if the muscle was attempting to hold itself in place despite protest.

"Are you asking for my credentials human, because all you have to do is look at yourself in a mirror to see my handwork. You're not brain dead and drooling all over yourself, so we can assume that I am good at my job."

Instead of growing offended like he assumed the human might, or even arguing with him. The creature's face broke into a very wide 'smile' displaying two rows of glittering white teeth. And then came the strange noise, it rose up from deep inside the humans chest warping and breaking as it was forced up through his mouth. It came in bursts like the revving of an engine on a string of sharp exhales.

Krill had never heard a creature make a sound like that before. Perhaps he had heard similar sounds recorded from distant jungle planets where the creatures were large and dangerous. But the sound cut off and the grin returned, "Well, you make an excellent argument doctor. How could I possibly say no? Now, can I please have my pants back?"

Walking next to the human, Dr. Krill was becoming exceedingly sure that the creature had been mocking him earlier. He wasn't entirely sure why he thought that, he wasn't nearly as adept at reading human facial expressions, or body postures as he would have liked to be, and he was also becoming increasingly more certain that human tonal variations were a very important part of their communication process.

For Krill, the human voice was at the lower end of his hearing register, but still audible. There were occasions when the human's voice would jump up in the register making it easier for Krill to detect, but that generally came paired with the strange twitching in the human's cheeks as if he was holding back a smile.

Krill wasn't stupid, in fact, testing on human IQ scales would have been inadvisable as he was so far above the human average. Based on his observations, he was positive the human was giving him signals he could not yet read, but that was fine, two could play this game.

Walking down the halls together, catching eyes as they went, and drawing more attention than Krill would have liked, the human kept up a steady stream of conversation. He would have gone and labeled the human as overly talkative if the information wasn't useful. "As you are probably aware by now, I am Captain Vir of the U.N.S.S Harbinger, a second generation intergalactic vessel under the command of the UNSC and on loan to the GA as a token of peace and cooperation between humanity and extraterrestrial life." They took a corner, and Krill was finding it hard to keep up with the human's long, powerful strides, which seemed to practically eat up the floor's distance as they went. "My standing orders are to foster intergalactic peace, promote intergalactic public relations, conduct research and exploration, and protect ALL species, from tyranny, war, and subjugation."

"A lot is expected of you," The Vrul pointed out dodging a cart of medical supplies as it came trundling down the hallway.

The human gestured by raising his shoulders and then lowering them again. "I suppose, but we have goals of our own to pursue while on this mission. First and foremost, being to have a bit of fun, and secondly we plan on eating our way through the galaxy if we can."

Krill felt his eyes widen, skidding to a halt and nearly bashing in to a passing orderly.

The human turned to look down at him, and upon seeing the terror on his face, he threw his hands up into the air. "Food, doc, sustenance, nourishment, cuisine." His eyes narrowed as he looked at the startled Vrul, "You didn't think I was actually going to eat you, did you?"

Krill responded with a wild gesticulation of his lower arms, "You ARE, structurally, a predator, so you can hardly blame me for that."

"Yeah, well where I come from we are literally the lamest predator ever. Plus, its safe to say that it's generally frowned upon to eat intelligent lifeforms and I have a general aversion to bugs."

"Bugs?"

"Nevermind, doc."

"But you DO eat meat?"

"Yeah of course," the human's voice grew momentarily distant," Mmm bacon."

"What is bacon?"

The two of them pressed through the docking field doors, and stepped outside under the light of the night sky. The human paused in his tracks, single eye reflecting the light of their gas giant which dominated the night sky and cast the planet's surface into perpetual twilight. He stood there for a long moment as if mesmerized by the sky above before shaking himself and continuing onwards intent on the angular black monolith dominating the launch field.

Krill still had to struggle to keep up.

Small black forms scuttled around the base of the ship, and by using his thermal receptors he was able to determine that those black dots were other humans, likely repairing and prepping their ship for further travel when that became possible.

The small doctor scuttled forward a little faster cutting the human off and causing him to draw to a halt. "Now listen here human. It is important that when I come aboard your ship my accommodations will be to my specifications."

The human stepped to the side intending to walk around him, "I'll see what I can do."

But Krill blocked his movement again. He KNEW the human needed him despite how he was acting. "No, that's not how this works. It's up to my specifications, or nothing... am I understood."

Another raised eyebrow, the gesture partially obscured by the black patch that now covered the missing organ, "You're kind of bossy, you know that?"

"Yes."

The strange revving noise broke from the human's throat as he pushed past Krill and continued walking down the field. He glanced over his shoulder as Krill scuttled after him, "You have my word, whatever you need..... consider it done."

.


	15. Chapter 15

A human male by the name of Roy C. Sullivan remains the only being (human or otherwise) to be struck by lightning seven times, and survive. For reference, these bolts of atmospheric electricity are made up of around 100 million volts, 20,000 amps and can reach temperatures of 30,000 kelvin, hotter than the surface of many stars. 

-

A single leaf, orange in colour with frosted yellow tips trembled in an early autumn breeze. The dry rattling of its dead and dying companions lent a mournful song to the light of a distant sun, whose rays somehow seemed dampened despite the unquestionable brightness of mid-day. The wind gusted hard, sharp with sudden urgency, and in its current the leaf was ripped from its branch, caught up in the wind and tugged along a short forest path before settling with an eruption of ripples at the very edge of a glassy forest pond. Another sudden gust of wind was enough to send the leaf sliding across the glassy surface and under the struts of an old, sagging dock. There the leaf lay for a long moment, before a clattering broke out along the dock above vibrating the wood and sending the leaf slowly gliding outwards and away on a rhythmic current.

"Damn, Thomas! Watch where you're swinging that thing! You almost took my head off."

"You know what, I'm not sorry. It would honestly be a marked improvement."

An eruption of snickering broke out, rattling the dock where the four boys sat shoes off, pants rolled up, staring into the water where their lines dragged small ripples across the mirrored surface.

At the far end of the group, the youngest and the shortest, Adam, sat tongue tucked between teeth as he tried, in vain, to thread a lure onto the end of the line. Another gust of wind tousled his scruffy, overgrown blond hair. He brushed the hair aside absently as it tickled at his ears and neck.

The poles they held looked nothing like their ancient counterparts, not with the anti-tangle carbon line, optional auto controlled reels, and ultra-flex shafts, which glowed a dim blue by way of inner battery pack tucked discreetly into the handle.

Jeremy, the tallest boy, dark haired and strapping, with a broad chest and thick arms pressed a button on the handle below the reel, launching the line again outwards onto the lake where it made a small ripple on the opaque, glassy surface before the water calmed once again.

Sandy-hair Tomas snorted with derision from where he sat next to Jeremy "Lame, watch this." He scrambled to his feet, reeled in his line, pulled his arm back and prepared to cast, but a strong hand caught him by the wrist.

"Uh, Thomas, remember what happened the last time you did that?"

Thomas frowned, "What? It was only his ear."

David, the second oldest of the brothers, shook his head, "Mom loves you enough to forgive you one time; next time she may decide she only needs three sons." Thomas pouted and the tall, handsome, dark-haired David shook his head in exasperation. "Look, you can do all the dumb-ass stuff you want when you are ALONE and can't spear Adam through the face, but for now just leave it."

Thomas grumbled and sat back down on the dock, "Adam, Adam, Adam, it's always all about Adam. Just because he's the youngest doesn't make him special."

Jeremy nudged him hard in the ribs with an elbow, "It does however make him more special than you, come to think of it, we are all more special than you."

Thomas rolled his eyes crossing his arms tightly over his slim chest.

"David is right and you know it so just shut up and fish."

"Thank you Jeremy," David continued, reaching back to run thoughtful fingers through his perfectly gelled hair. David was, arguably, the handsomest of the brothers and they would know cause they had argued about it a lot, he was also the most reliable, responsible, and probably the smartest. Thomas had been voted the ugliest on principal, and that probably hadn't helped his intensely choleric temper.

At the end of the peer, Adam was still struggling to tie his lure, and absently his older brother David plucked the lure from his hand and quickly looped the string, handing it back without so much as glancing over. Adam stared down at the neatly tied knot with a defeated expression but didn't say anything as he engaged the cast button and watched as the colorful lure shot through the air to land in a patch of lily pads a good few yards to their right. Shoulders slumped, he kicked his feet thoughtfully above the surface of the water.

"So how's work been?" Thomas asked his oldest brother, manually reeling his lure a little closer towards the pier. A trail of V shaped ripples germinated in hopes of attracting the fish below.

Jeremy shrugged his large shoulders, "It's work, bouncing isn't all it's cracked up to be, just dealing with drunk assholes and an ungodly amount of bodily fluids," He kicked his feet and sighed, "but you do what you gotta do. Maybe by the end of the year I'll have enough money to go to that hover-cycle repair trade school I was talking about."

The group of boys muttered their support for their oldest brother. Despite all his good news, they still missed him, regardless of what Thomas might claim, and it was good to have him back. He had graduated a year ago, and was trying his best to adult. They probably wouldn't bother telling him how much they missed him. As close as the four brothers had been, it had been hard to see one of them go, and soon enough another would be on his way. For the rest of them it was difficult, but the breakup of their close friend circle was especially distressing for the youngest brother who worried quietly about finding himself alone when the others were all gone.

They were the only friends he had.

"So David, why don't you tell us what mom's favorite son has planned for the future," Jeremy teased.

David rolled his eyes and shook his head with a fond smile for his older brother, "I got a letter yesterday...." the group leaned forward over the water craning their necks for a better view of their second oldest brother.

Thomas raised an eyebrow, "I'm trembling with suspense." His vocal inflection made it pretty clear he was not, in fact, trembling with suspense.

David threw an irascible yet fond smile to his younger, and most irresponsible brother, "Well, I got accepted to Stanford in the fall-"

Before he could continue, crazed cheering broke out across the lake, and the water below them rippled with their pleasure. Adam nearly dropped his pole having forgotten he was holding it in his enthusiasm. Luckily, David was there to avert crisis and caught it before it could touch the water handing it back to his shamefaced youngest brother.

"I was thinking Aeronautics and Astronautics Engineering. It will be a fascinating and lucrative field of study with the breakthroughs we have been making in space travel over the past hundred years, the progress just lately is mind-blowing. "

"Yeah, I heard something about that. Didn't they just start construction on the first-"

"Interstellar spaceship! Well, theoretically it could be intergalactic," The three oldest turned to the youngest who had finally brightened from his noticeable sulk, "the Enterprise, they're naming it the Enterprise after the ship in Star Trek." His expression had broken into a face-splitting smile, "It'll be powered by a first generation warp-core, the first of its kind designed using the Bernthal Equation. You see, you don't even have to travel as fast as light when using the ship because, because it folds space instead, so theoretically you can travel faster than light by cutting the distance by billions of light years using temporary wormholes cut in space, so the issue of changes in space time aren't even an issue. You could potentially travel across the entire universe in a month or less."

"Nerd."

Jeremy dug his elbow into Thomas' ribs shutting him up with a huff.

David laughed and wrapped an arm around his youngest brother, "Just a sophomore and this kid already knows more than I ever will." He ruffled the younger man's scruffy blond hair laughing as Adam tried to scramble away nearly dropping his pole again.

"So Thomas, what do you plan on doing with your life because mom says you CAN'T be a degenerate bum lying on her couch?"

Thomas gesticulated a crude response before gently toggling the reel which whirred quietly. "Ha, you're hilarious. I'm not stayin' in this town, and that's for sure. I'm thinking maybe I'll move to LA, be a stuntman in movies."

The group of them collectively shook their heads. Only last month he had been talking about moving to New York to become a photographer for all the hot runway models.

Three pairs of eyes turned to the last brother, "How about you kid, what do you want to do?"

Adam looked up from the water introspectively, paused and then, "I want to be an astronaut, or...or something with space. I am going to space, I'm just not sure how yet."

"Why am I not surprised?"

Jeremy quickly lifted his head "Wait, you know what Adam, I think I saw somewhere... something... I think the Air Force is recruiting specifically for space. I think they are starting to recruit for that big ship you were talking about, but I mean.... I could be wrong."

The young man's eyes were enormous, so wide that the lake below and the sky above were simultaneously reflected in his green eyes.

"Are you serious?" The pier below rattled with the force of his excitement, and David smartly snatched Adam's fishing pole from the air just in time for him to nearly drop it for a third time.

"Seriously man, be more careful will yah, dad will kill us if we lose the poles." Eventually he handed it back to his delighted little brother as the conversation continued while a rather bulbous frog croaked somewhere in the distance. "It makes sense. They've developed a lot of new technology, and they are going to need an entirely new generation of people trained on that equipment."

Jeremy jabbed Thomas in the side, just to annoy the younger man. "Why don't they just retrain the old people? I mean, they probably have a lot of the skills these guys will be looking for."

The top of David's pole deflected towards the water and with a slight grunt he eagerly began to manually engage the reel. David had always been like that. He much preferred to do things without the assistance of technology if he could help it. Mother had always liked to joke that the boy would have become Amish if he wasn't so terribly allergic to most barnyard animals. "Think about it, it makes sense, I am sure they will retain a ton of the older officers, but you know adults, the older you get the less receptive you are to new technology. They are easily set in their ways and sometimes it's just easier to train new people than it is to re-train the older ones. Besides, a good mix of experience and innovation or trailblazing is what they will need for this to be successful."

Adam leaned out over the water to peer at his oldest brother poised to grill him with even more questions about this supposed space recruitment program, but a sudden tug on the end of his line and the rather precarious nature of how he sat cut him off with a sudden shock of cold and a bout of ruckus laughter.

-

The Air Force recruiting office sat sandwiched between a rather run down nail salon and an antique store old enough to be an antique itself, if not a historic archeological dig site. That strip of buildings sat just across the road from a picturesque, and somewhat forested park with rambling little pathways meandering through the trees, and circling around a large memorial, or a 2000-year-old decommissioned M1 Abrams Tank masquerading as a memorial. A relic from when international terrorism was still an issue and before the Third World War had nearly brought the planet to the brink of destruction.

Even after 2000 years, the Army still had a proclivity for painting all their vehicles on a gradient scale which ranged anywhere from sandy brown to forest green. If it weren't for their ability to hover, and their location across the street, the three military jeeps, owned by the recruiting officers, might have been mistaken as part of the memorial. They did, however, make an almost laughable dichotomy between civilian and military life; a 3000 lb war vehicle parked next to some soccer mom's minivan just under the blinking sign advertising pediatric dentistry just a few doors down.

The Air Force recruiting office, technically only a cubicle next to the recruiting offices for the Army and the Marines, housed a single sergeant behind a too-wide desk in a too-small cubby-hole framed by holographic recruiting posters, and a single ragged flag gone grey with age. It was so old in fact, that is seemed dangerously close to crumbling to dust at the slightest movement. It was almost difficult to tell the difference between the fading red and the fading blue, but the stars were still visible enough. It was a flag that should have been properly retired years ago due to its condition but since it hadn't been you wondered at its significance. A chipped coffee mug sat on the desk with the dregs of the morning curdled inside and ringed by countless years of use. The scrawling letter-work on the outside read:

Number 1# Dad

The man that sat behind the desk was probably in his mid-forties, a once fit man who was now struggling to fight off those extra pounds which could sneak up so easily when you switched from an active lifestyle to a more sedentary desk job. However, those few extra pounds were covered relatively well by the patterned ACUs he wore. More than two thousand years and camouflage hadn't gone out of style with the military. Aside from the ability to change the pattern at will to match the environment, not a whole lot had changed, primarily due to tradition, but another part could be contributed a lack of fashion awareness among the ranks of the military.

A fly buzzed somewhere in the room, and the man sighed flipping a holographic projection upwards. Half of his visual field was covered by documents, but the other half was covered by a half-finished game of mahjong. You would think after a couple hundred years, developers could come up with more entertaining default games for their electronics. He would even have settled for pinball, but no such luck. It was this, chess, solitaire, or minesweeper of all things, but he was already risking himself by screwing off on company time, and that was 100% the reason that he nearly fell out of his chair upon hearing the door open. He scrambled for the hologram before minimizing it and tossing it away to disappear in midair.

A second later a loud bang followed by some muttered curse words, if you could really call darn it and shiz curse words, and a young man breached his cubicle. His face was flushed, and his blonde hair was matted with a thin sheen of sweat. He had either been running, or it was a really hot day outside. He was a skinny kid, kind of short with bright green eyes.

"Can I-"

Before the sergeant could finish, the boy had rushed his desk, and in a moment of sheer enthusiasm which could have been mistaken for anger, but clearly wasn't, and slammed his open palms on the desk.

"I want to go to space."

That took the sergeant back, "Slow your roll kid."

"Please," the boy's eyes went from excited to pleading. It was like looking into the eyes of a twice kicked dog that still loved its owner enough to come back for more. It was honestly pretty heartbreaking.

"Just hold on a minute, take a seat, slow down, and introduce yourself."

The boy smiled sheepishly and held out a hand, "Adam Vir....."

The sergeant took the young man's steady hand, "Sergeant Jackson." The kid was as pale as a ghost, a dichotomy made even more apparent against his own well-tanned skin. "Start over and go from the beginning."

The boy's eyes were earnest and guileless as he took a deep breath, "I want to go to space. I heard you are hiring people to go to space. I would do ANYTHING to go and you can make that happen."

The room went quiet as the sergeant studied the young man's face. He had seen similar young men and women before. Kids who were bored with their lives and thought joining the Air Force or the Army was a thrill. They generally disappeared once they realized this wasn't going to be all it was cracked up to be, or they got stuck in a miserable five-year contract with an obligation to the government that left them with no uncertain terms what would happen to them if they backed out.

The sergeant was sure this was not one of those cases. Looking into those determined green orbs he realized with no uncertainty that this kid wasn't lying, he would do anything.

With one hand, the sergeant scratched at the back of his head, running fingers over his regulation cut. "Look kid, this isn't JUST about going to space. This is about serving the UN, so-"

"And I WILL serve. I'll be the best recruit you've ever signed. Please I'd-"

"Do anything, yeah, I got that." With his left hand Jackson absently tapped his pen against the desk staring at the earnest young face whose body was taught with anticipation.

The young man was enthusiastic, he would give him that, so he shifted back in his chair and looked him over. He was skinny, but that was fine, a product of age more than anything else. His bright green eyes seemed to hinted heavily towards intelligence and eagerness. WHen it came to recruiting, intelligence was always a good start.

He reached down inside his desk and withdrew a stack of papers. Despite this being the early stages of recruiting, things were right. There were hundreds of applicants with similar mindsets and dreams as this kid. All of them wanted to go to space, and all of them wanted to do it with the first launch of the Enterprise. He would wager to guess that a lot of those kids didn't have what it took to make it through training, but you never knew, and with this kid he just had a gut feeling that the odds were in his favor.

He set the papers down on the desk, "Tell you what, you're underage so you get your parents in here to approve this, and I'll send in your paperwork. If you get in, you get in, if you don't you don't. And if you do get in, but drop out of training, at least you got your shot."

The boy nodded so enthusiastically it seemed he might send his head rolling across the floor, "Yes sir, I will." He turned to run out and nearly clobbered himself on the doorframe as he was heading out.

Sgt. Jackson stood partially from his seat, fingertips keeping him upright as he leaned slightly over the desk calling after the retreating figure, "Hey kid?"

The young man turned somewhat abashed, patting the door frame almost apologetically. "Traumatic brain injury is an immediate rejection of your application, so try not to concuss yourself before making it back here."

An embarrassed grin broke wide over the kid's face, "Yes sir," and with that he hurried from the room. Sgt. Jackson could hear the thud of feet as they rushed across the foyer and out the door. He shook his head as the footsteps vanished.

What an intense kid.

***

The sound of a human ship igniting its engines is an experience the doctor determined should be a once in a lifetime experience.

He didn't mean once in a lifetime experience in the same way that hotels advertise beachfront vacations. He meant the kind of once in a lifetime experience that is only, once in a lifetime, because you may not be alive to experience it a second time.

He was almost 90 percent positive that the human had loitered outside on purpose.

The ignition had begun with a distant rumbling accompanied by a whining hiss, but as the seconds wore on the rumbling grew into a steady tremor and then a rattling quake that seemed determined to tear the ground apart, but it got worse, so much worse: a hiss turned into a screaming and then a shrieking and then a roaring and then all at the same time. If he didn't know better he would have assumed their star had plunged through their orbit and broken through the atmospheric barrier. The day, which had been quite still before now, suddenly whipped itself up around them into a thunderous cacophony of screaming wind forcing the doctor into an uncontrolled skid back across the tarmac, four limbs held up in front of his face desperately trying to block the thundering gale.

Ahead of him, the human stood sure footed and grounded on the tarmac, large black boots spread to shoulder width, black jacket whipping around him in the breeze, face turned to the roaring torrent. Above him, the fading sun was just allowing their neighboring gas giant to sharpen against the light-scattered atmosphere outlining the dark monolith of a ship with its blue rings. Tawny hair lightened by the fire of the engines, the human turned a predatory smile to the doctor exposing too many teeth and too much of his gums. The green of his eyes flashed with silent, unmistakable joy.

This was a ship made by predators for predators.

The doctor struggled against the continued roaring as he was forced back another two feet. He grew dizzy against the onslaught barely aware when the human walked the few feet back to assist him forward, one hand at his dorsal side. Together they made their way up the hydraulic ramp and into the belly of the daunting monolith. His attached helium sack billowed and snapped painfully in the wind threatening to tear itself off and go tumbling across the tarmac.

The ship itself was a brutal piece of engineering, blocky and rough without the refined curves of a Rundi ship, or the jutting warlike points of a Drev short-cruiser. It had the aesthetic appeal of a brick. The outside was a mess of line rivets and melting points, which held the monstrosity together. It wouldn't have surprised the doc if the whole outside wasn't just an amalgamation of a thousand different plates riveted, welded or heat-bonded together to form the crude hull. Where most GA ships were equipped with protective field generators, this thing was clearly built without the functions of advanced shielding in mind, the outside of the ship clearly WAS the shielding.

The aesthetics, or lack thereof, were only heightened by its blunt black color, probably meant to blend in with the backdrop of space though, here crouched on the ground, it was simply a monolithic monstrosity against the multi-colored darkening sky. A set of six massive engines was obviously the only reason this thing could feasibly haul itself into the air. There was a set of two rear thrusters, another two on the midline and the remaining two at the front. From the ramp he could clearly see that the forward four thrusters could be folded up into compartments on the side of the ship, while the rear thrusters were meant to adjust into a horizontal position on the back of the ship once they had made it out of the atmosphere. Along the top of the ship, near it's spine, he could just make out a set of strange characters painted on in white. As it was, he could not read them without the specialized translation software.

His outside view of the ship vanished behind a thick metal wall, and the sound of the engines were cut off as the ramp hissed closed with a sharp thud and accompanying click. Looking forward, he was met with a demonstration of organized chaos the likes of which he had never thought possible. Inside was a cavernous space, a massive room just as austere and brutal in it's aesthetic as the outside of the ship, lined inside with towering columns of boxes and blocky containers lit by a strange ambient yellow light which pervaded the cavern with an almost sickly glow. Now add almost a hundred humans scurrying about in chaotic lines, carrying, lifting, and barking orders as they re-adjusted their containers for takeoff.

Krill could not discern any sense of organization, and no way the humans should have been able to operate without running headlong into each other; yet they operated like a hive mind, somehow managing to avoid any terrible disaster while still maintaining all the grace and coordination of a meteorite collision. Together they weaved through pools of shadow and light ducking, swerving and wriggling past each other with a strange chaotic ease.

On the far side of the room, the same sort of behavior was being conducted around a line of strange machines, most with wheels, some with wings, all painted the same drab grey color. In comparison to the ship, the vehicles with wings demonstrated an altogether different type of engineering from what he had seen so far. These machines were sleek and streamlined, every line was fit perfectly into a seamless metal shell, a thousand years perfected. It seemed clear that the humans had been flying for longer than they had been traveling in space.

Next to him, the human took a deep, exaggerated breath, eyes closing as the muscles of his upper cheek contracted to pull up the corners of his mouth. Krill couldn't have said what the expression was for, but he would have wagered to guess that it was a good one. With his right hand, the human stroked the smooth metal of the ship's interior. When his hand gently came away Krill could see that the dark grey color had eroded, and a shiny silver smudge could be seen glittering from underneath, as if it had been worn away from many such caresses.

"That's my girl," the human crooned softly under his breath.

Krill only understood the possessive pronoun, and couldn't have guessed why the human would be whispering to himself. Not like it mattered, as, after a moment the human turned that startlingly green eye upon him before raising his arms to gesture wildly around the ship. The entire movement was greatly exaggerated and would have exposed all of the creature's internal organs for any potential attack, "Well Doctor, welcome to the UNSS Harbinger." That expression, now familiar to the doctor, returned with greater enthusiasm, "What do you think of her?"

The doctor took another look around at the cluttered cavern; poorly lit, blocky and rough interior, chaotic movements of the humans, a non hive mind pretending to be one with limited success, before falling again on the crude and unsophisticated way in which the ship seemed to have been put together, like whoever had made it wasn't entirely sure what they were doing, or they had been suspended upside down when trying to read the instruction manual, "You flew here, on a machine erected of scrap metal and poorly executed plans?"

The human's smile fell and he suddenly lowered his chin to cover the soft spot of his neck. He stepped aggressively or defensively in front of Krill as if he was shielding the ship from Krill's words or threatening to attack Krill for his observations. A dark shadow passed over his eyes as the angle of light was adjusted. Krill shrunk back slightly against the overt show of aggression.

"Now hold on just a minute. I know she doesn't look like much but she's the best ship this side of Andromeda, and I won't have you disrespecting her like that."

A group of humans passed by just then working in unison to carry one of the blocky crates that made up most of the landscape in this strange place. Krill couldn't help but notice the way their feet moved, how the muscles rolled up their backs with sinuous grace.

"Nice eye patch," one of them called over his shoulder as the others chorused their agreement.

Of course the doctor's presence did not go unnoticed and he couldn't help but shiver at the six pairs of eyes which remained locked on him as they passed, the black apertures of their eyes contracting and zeroing in on him like an automated targeting system.

He glanced over at his human companion.

And there it was again, that expression, the humans used that expression a lot but Krill did not think it always meant the same thing, did it?

The human turned away from his retreating companions to place his focus back on Krill, "Look, I know she's not as nice as your GA long-cruisers, or even the GA's Imperium, but she's got something that their's doesn't."

"Hull rot?" Krill wondered as the two of them began walking down the outer edge of the cavern.

Finally, he saw a new expression and he didn't much like it. The little furry lines above the human's eye sockets had coalesced into a V and the corners of the mouth had dragged down. The head tilted, but the neck was not exposed.

"I would say you're trying to be funny, but something tells me that's not something they do on your planet, so my only other conclusion is that you are making fun of my ship, and understand this doctor, NO ONE disrespects or makes fun of ... MY...ship."

The way the human looked at him just then demonstrated there was something worse on a human than an empty expression. He was just about ready to turn around and disembark, this had been a bad idea, when the man's expression did a complete one eighty switching suddenly back to a relaxed smile. "She's second generation on intergalactic travel, patterned on the original forerunner design, sort of meant to be a smaller copy of our very first iteration. So she's a forerunner model battle class with an Alpha-1 warp core." A group of large humans in strange patterned clothing stopped in front of them placing themselves into an uncannily straight line.

Krill nearly jumped out of his skin as, in perfect synchronization, the humans raised their hands at an acute angle to bring their fattened palms horizontally against their temples, "Captain on deck!" came a booming announcement.

"At ease Marines."

The group of humans dropped their hands in synchronization, "Wicked eyepatch," one of them commented on their way past. Krill watched mesmerized as their feet pounded into the deck in an uncannily perfect rhythm.

"The Alpha-1 rating has to do entirely with the Bernthal Equation. You see, the further the distance to warp means the greater amount of space the ship has to fold in order to create a viable wormhole, as you would imagine a Delta-5 class warp can really only get you across a single solar system. However, as it turns out the actual initiation of a fold is the hard part, and the more you try to fold the more the universe sort of just..... follows the stuff you have already folded, so after a certain point you don't need to exert any more power. Any warp core rated with an Alpha drive can, theoretically, cover the entire distance of the universe in one warp. However, the number that comes after its class is related to the number of times the warp core can do an alpha warp before requiring replacement. This ship has an Alpha-1 warp core, meaning she could go across the universe about 10 times before shutting down, a Charlie core can get you interstellar, a Bravo core can go intergalactic, but only an Alpha core has the theoretic capability to go trans-universal."

Krill stopped to stare at the human blankly, "How fast is your ship exactly?"

The human shrugged, "Slow doc, slow as hell. It takes up to three weeks to get across the solar system just on our own power."

"You.... cannot travel at light speed?"

The human rumbled a low repetitive growl in his chest "Hell no, this isn't Star Wars. Light speed is a ridiculous dream that comes with more problems than it does uses. You think our power output is ridiculous, well light speed is just stupid, plus then you have to deal with time dilation, thanks but no thanks. I would like to go home and visit my family on occasion, not stay young and watch them grow old and die from a distance. Thank you very much."

Krill almost ran himself into the next doorframe staring at the human in wonder. Every other species known in the universe had worked with light speed before they even thought about using warp tunnels, but the humans, instead of first attempting to work within the bounds of the universe, they had immediately moved to forcing the universe to LITERALLY bend to their will, that is why their ship design seemed so behind. This was their FIRST iteration of a long-range ship ignoring the mechanics of light speed like it was some joke. It made some sense though, there were rumors in the galactic community that his own species, the Vrul, and their closest related species, the Gibb were a byproduct of a single race separated by the original first colonization by light speed, allowing an origin species to evolve separately, though that had never been proven.

They passed out the open docking bay and into a dark, cramped tunnel teaming with humans scuttling around with their strange predatory nature, eyes falling on Krill and tracking him slowly as he went past. Unconsciously, the doctor scooted closer to the protective cover of the human's legs attempting to conceal himself from the hungry predatory gazes that followed him through the tube.

Of course the human noticed none of this, remaining obliviously relaxed for one of the greatest apex predators in the known galaxy, waving his upper extremities at the other humans, and barking greetings with his powerful, human vocals. They growled, hooted, hissed and barked their greetings back. Krill noticed early on that humans seem to have a subconscious need to touch one another. The hands were an especially important focal point of contact, and Krill noticed three major forms of greeting.

The first greeting involved wrapping two hands together and oscillating them up and down a few times, the second appeared to Krill to be an aggressive show of domination where the humans slapped their open palms together, probably in some primitive domination ritual.

The last greeting was the most aggressive, it included trying to crush another person with full torso contact, and interlocked upper extremities. Despite the violent nature of the greetings, the humans seemed to enjoy it, spending most of their greeting ritual "smiling."

Body language seemed to be a very important component of human social interaction. He could tell this based on the simple fact that humans NEVER STOPPED MOVING. The hands especially were in constant motion: sweeping, gyrating, commanding, gesticulating and thrown about in all directions. Overall, Krill had great difficulty keeping up with conversations. The humans had a serious habit of relaying information through gestures, eye movement, facial expressions, the shortening of their words, or the use of unfamiliar word relations. His translator considered phonetics, semantics, and syntax but when combined with context the doc was left confused and out of sorts as he tried to figure out what was going on.

"Hey, Henry!" The human bellowed, pointing out one of the men passing in the dark metal tunnel. This human excessively tall, an absolute monster of a creature with arms twice as thick as many of his counterparts, and at least six inches taller than the captain. He had ebony skin, gold eyes and was lacking the fur many of the humans produced atop their heads. He wore a grey jumpsuit with dark stains, but his hands seemed relatively clean as they locked with the captain's hand for one of those human greetings.

"How's my girl?" the captain inquired, "didn't miss me too much, did she?"

The dark human snorted a loud gust of air from his nose, "Missed you, she got a well-deserved break FROM you."

Who was this she they were talking about?

The captain waved a hand, "Oh come on Henry, you worry too much. What is the point of having an advanced warship if you don't use her to her full capacity?"

Golden eyes rolled hard, "Using her to her full capacity, and testing her PAST the point of her best operational curve do NOT mean the same thing."

"Just gotta take the fun out of everything don't you?" he said bouncing up the hallway on the balls of his feet.

"HEY CAP," came a deep, thrumming call. The captain turned around, walking backwards with the same seamless ease as he walked forward still forcing the doctor to struggle to keep up with him.

"Yeah?'

Henry motioned to the captain's face, "You aren't a space pirate, so ditch the eye patch you look stupid."

"Love you too Henry." The captain laughed, turning up the dark path cutting in and out through swarms of humans who parted in surprise when they saw Krill scuttling after. Together they moved through a tight maze of unfinished hallways ducking past exposed steel piping, and cutting through cramped doorways.

The human ship was a veritable warren of tunnels, rooms, and tightly cramped spaces all lined with exposed wiring, piping, and discarded equipment. Out of context, Krill would never have guessed that it was a ship, but probably assumed it was some sort of underground fortress, dimly lit. If not that, perhaps the carcass of some long forgotten beast, and here they were crawling through its bowels like the parasitic interlopers that they were.

Logically though, he shouldn't have expected much more from the humans. They were only in their infancy when it came to space travel, and with their anatomy it was too presumptuous to expect a ship similar in design to the Vrul ships: large and spherical with an open concept center that branched outwards in all directions and angles. The Vrul themselves did not require gravity the same way humans did, and so their ship had no gravity generators. Every possible surface of the ship was used to its logical conclusion. On the outside, their ships appeared spherical, but if you were to cut it in half, you might find an empty center and a surrounding ring that appeared porous like bone, a network of tunnels and pockets that rolled around each other in a delicate dance. The Vrul ship was elegant compared to the human's creation which seems to have been beaten into architectural submission.

He could hardly blame them, it was doubtful a human would have been able to move freely on a Vrul ship, much less get from one end to the other unless they could fly... the humans had surprised him before so perhaps they could and Krill just didn't know yet.

Ahead of him, the human squeezed through a particularly tight door, "Almost there," he muttered.

From there, they clambered up a set of solid, yet narrow steel stairs and through another doorway which opened onto, what appeared to be, the only finished area of the ship. There was no exposed piping, and the lights were almost unbearably bright, not helped in any way by the light grey metal used to cover and insulate the piping underneath. The humans here were wearing similar outfits of light grey, clearly they were supposed to mean something different from the darker grey of the jumpsuits downstairs, but he wasn't sure what.

As they passed into this tunnel, the humans paused to acknowledge their captain, also using it as an opportunity to stare at Krill, in that strange, unnerving way they had. As tall as they were Krill couldn't have helped but be intimidated by the forest of eyes looking down on him from three feet above.

The captain, of course, made no sign he noticed, too busy greeting his pack members sometimes nodding and sometimes returning their strange hand gestures.

They moved up one last flight of stairs, and the doorway before them opened into a large semicircular room of grey steel. The outer walls of the room were lined in consoles with a dizzying number of buttons, dials, screens and projections. Lights blinked and flashed as many voices overlapped each other. At each console sat a human. They came in a surprising array of shapes, sizes, colors and features, yet each one wore the same pristine grey clothing as had those in the hallway before.

"CAPTAIN ON DECK!"

All the humans snapped from their seats to acknowledge their alpha with a lifted arm and a raised voice.

"At ease!" The captain stepped down from the open doorway and onto the upper deck of the bridge. Clearly at home, the human strode across the deck, black jacket rippling with his movement.

"Initiate the ignition sequence," he ordered, sliding onto the central seat at the hub of the bridge. The way the humans designed their ship made it absolutely clear who was in charge, demonstrating to Krill a very strict hierarchical social system. How had he missed it before? Yet, thinking back there had been no clues. Did status or hierarchy exist only in certain circumstances? With his species there was a clearly defined hierarchy which permeated and dictated all aspects of life on his planet.

As soon as the captain's weight transferred to the seat a set of projections sprung up before his face "Preflight checklist?" He queried, swiping through a dizzying array of information in rapid succession.

"Checked and rechecked captain."

"Well I think we should check it one more time, don't you?"

"Yes, sir."

The human leaned back in his seat, which swiveled to survey the entirety of the room, "Engines!"

"Charging to 10% Captain, maintenance checks have been performed, and all preflight diagnostics reflect optimum status, sir."

"That's what I like to hear, now keep it coming, give me a crew count," he spun around in his chair almost playfully staring at the ceiling as he listened to the crewmembers rattle off information.

"All crew present and accounted for, sir. Rear hanger doors are locked and secure, and all excess cargo has been restrained." Below their feet the ground began to rumble. He could feel it through the steel floors of the ship, and that only added to his already bubbling anxiety as the group of humans finally began to notice his presence.

"Navigations, set a course for entry into the Milky Way by way of quickest warp zone, and send a transmission to UNSC headquarters to give me a ring when we're out of warp." While the other humans scrambled to do his bidding, the captain turned in his chair to survey Krill, "You might want to strap yourself in, doctor, this ship isn't exactly graceful in atmo."

He turned back to his work, and Krill scuttled towards an open seat, not entirely sure what he was going to do, but hoping that he wasn't just about to die from an excessive amount of G-force. The human that sat closest to him stared with wide, brown eyes, which twitched across Krill's body in tiny little jerks and leaps. Krill couldn't imagine what being inside the creature's head must have felt like with vision that disjointed.

"Charged to ten percent, sir."

The floor below them was vibrating enough to rock the ship apart, and Krill squeezed himself tight to a chair unfit for a Vrul as the power threatened to rip his skeletal structure apart.

"Ignition in 10... 9...8..."

The Captain engaged a set of commands on his chair, and the entire seat seemed to split open like a flower in bloom. Metal cocoons poured out to encase his hands and feet while a clattering sequence of belts locked his shoulders and chest into place against the back of the chair. From the headrest, a small projection snaked over the back of his head and caused a semicircular projection to appear in front of his face.

It was at that moment that Krill realized the human intended to manually pilot the craft out of atmosphere.

7...6...5...

Krill was over it.

The captain engaged a set of switches on the left side of his console, and then pressed down on a small red button, "Crewmembers of the UNSC Harbinger, this is your captain speaking. I advise you to strap in if you haven't already, or risk braining yourself on the nearest sharp object. You have been warned."

He didn't want to be here anymore. This was madness. These humans were undoubtedly mad.

"4.... 3... 2... "

Why had he been so stupid?

"1"

Somewhere below them, the engines roared to life with the power of an igniting star. Hydrogen atoms fused themselves together to create a mass bank of power that, in the doctor's opinion was absolute overkill.

He held on for dear life, convinced that in the next few moments he was going to be encased in a roaring ball of fire and die a horrible, horrible, painful death.

No such thing happened, in fact, their ascent through the atmosphere was almost comically slow, and for a ship so big, other than the rattling of the engines, he hardly noticed a change in their atmospheric condition. Had he underestimated the ability of the ship or was the human just a VERY good pilot? He had his doubts.

However, watching the captain from his secured space, Krill couldn't help but notice the set line of his jaw, and the focus at which his eyes were locked onto the screen before him. His hands and feet performed many micro rotations, it seemed that he was using both his feet and his hands to pilot the ship.

"Lieutenant, engage outer hull cameras."

"Yes, sir."

Krill blinked in shock as the overhead lights dimmed and the once blank steel at the front of the room suddenly exploded into a field of stars. He would have assumed that the view was a window, except for the occasional rush of static, almost imperceptibly fast, that broke through the image. They cruised into a slow orbit, and Krill could feel his body growing light.

"Engaging interior gravity field."

The sensation was gone as soon as it had come, and the rattling of the engines dissipated. Below them, the delicate red orange face of their planet rotated eerily in the silent blackness that was space.

"Lieutenant, command is yours," something clicked, and the captain's chair returned to its former, unassuming position. The captain slid onto the desk with a soft thud and walked over to where the doctor still clutched to his restraints, "Come doctor, may as well show you around the ship."

The humans looked up, again, curiously from their seats.

The Captain noticed, and turned to survey his crew, "Ah, forgive me for not introducing you sooner. Everyone meet your new chief medical officer, Dr. Krill who, in his own words, claims to be the highest rated medical professional this side of Andromeda."

A murmuring grew up around the room. The universal translation equipment was unable to pick out any one phrase, so allowed the human's natural voices to break through. There was a lot of deep rumbling, harsh sibilants, hissed stridents and unnatural affricates. Krill felt his insides grow watery as he noticed all the predatory eyes locked upon him. In the dimmed lighting, their faces were cast with many eerie blue shadows, especially about the eyes.

The Captain nudged him with a leg, and Krill nearly leaped to the ceiling, "Anything to say doctor?"

Krill quickly straightened himself, doing his best to maintain composure around these strange creatures, "It is not a claim, I have been awarded the title by the Galactic Assembly and the Intergalactic Medical Association."

The captain grinned patting Krill atop the head with a free hand, "Hear that everyone, stole him right out from under the nose of the GA, and now he's all ours." The murmuring grew louder.

"You can't say that I don't take care of you guys," the human boasted to his companions before motioning Krill towards the doors. "Now doctor, it's best I give you a little tour of the ship, and take you to the medical wing."

As he was ushered form the bridge, Krill couldn't help but turn to glance back.

Through the crack in the slowly closing door, he caught one last glimpse of the bridge, dark but for the light of the looming gas giant and holographic projections which cast an eerie light over all available surfaces:

All available surfaces including more than a dozen sets of wide, glittering eyes, eyes he felt locked onto his soul long after the doors were shut, and the bridge vanished behind him into dimness.

.


	16. Chapter 16

The human nose is capable of distinguishing 1 trillion separate odors based on the arrangement of an estimated 400 types of scent receptors. Only a handful of species, including the Drev, are known to have this sense, though only humans demonstrate it's use to such a high degree.   
-

The sky above Anum was overcast with accumulated ash. It was the dark season, and the atmosphere above was thick with the increased fervor of Anum's inner breath. Sickly clouds clotted out the sun leaving the usually colorful landscape drab and muted. The colorful mosses hung onto life by a thread of breath slowly dying as they waited for the sun to return. In certain years, an unusually long dark season would result in varying degrees of famine as the mosses were forced to regrow themselves from the corpses of their forebears. If that were to happen, the entirety of their land would become brown and barren with ash. The Coil Trees would stop bearing fruit, and their hibernation would begin as they waited for dead plants to mix with the soil creating the only source of fertility to plant life without the sun, but this dark season was just beginning, leaving plenty of time for famine or food.

The dwellings of Omphalos, conquering village of the fertile belt, sat under an umbrella of ash, lording over the land of darkness. Distantly, the ash was lit by a bolt of subdued lightning acknowledged only by muffled and indistinct thunder. Little orbs of glowing blue light had sprung up within the village. Singly, "spirit orbs" hung from the two polar corners of each low dwelling. Most times, the gesture was simply an outlet for tradition, but there were more conservative factions that believed that spirit orbs placed at the polar apexes of a dwelling repelled the spirits formed from the darkness above.

Another distant bolt of lightning cut a jagged gash through the clouds above lighting the thick interior with an eerie blue glow not dissimilar to the pale pallor of a corpse rigid from asphyxiation. The eerie blueness cast its pallor over the central cathedral whose dark spires clawed towards the sky as if in an attempt to pierce the cloud cover. The very tallest, blackest spire was the only one to succeed in this endeavor vanishing into the mist above obscured by ash and darkness. Perhaps such an edifice would not seem strange to a creature from off-world, like the humans so used to building their fortresses skyward; but here, in a place where the dwellings lay so close to the ground, the sheer towering gash that was the cathedral's spire was absolutely breathtaking, a demonstration of might and power and mythical engineering, for something so thin, and made of such delicate volcanic glass couldn't have survived for so long. Yet here it was, a conduit between earth and sky.

The Temple of the Four Warriors had stood since time long past and had been witness to the rise and fall of the clans. Blood had baptized it's steps, and fire had cleansed its stone, and here it stood like a watcher, the four short spires, representing the four warriors, standing solemnly to guard their conduit to heaven; the conduit, the spire, which was believed to bring divine luck, energy, and wisdom from the spirits of the ether. Only the most powerful clan was permitted to worship within its walls.

At the center of the fertile belt, Omphalos was the seat of power for both the divine and the native and would be so until the spirits deemed otherwise, and war brought a new general to their lands.

But, today, there were no fires, there was no blood, there was no war. The village below the cathedral was silent and still except for the watchful guards with their soft footfalls and careful movements. Off in the distance, the rumble of volcanic fire added an disquieted ambiance to already eerie surroundings. Even the ashen training fields were barren but for the carrion feeders, maggoty little creatures, which slithered through the ash all sallow and moist to feed on the debris of the dead.

Scenes of life flickered from inside the low village dwellings, but otherwise, all was still.

Behind stone doors, within the heart of the citadel life teamed and voices echoed toward the vaulted ceiling; quiet hissings, gurglings and clicking murmurings rose and fell. The citadel was exponentially larger than it appeared from the outside. The original builders had carved the foundation deep, deep into the stone so that when one stepped inside they found themselves looking down onto the citadel far below.

From the center chamber, four identical hallways led into perpendicular towers. There were rooms deeper underground where the Sentinel found her rest and conducted business with the other members of the council. A set of intricate yet tenacious stairs made a slow trek about the vast vestibule, ringing the central floor in an almost gallery-like manner.

Unlike traditional Roman-Catholic, Gothic, or even Russian Orthodox cathedrals of similar intent, the dark interior was noticeably devoid of art or ornamentation. The floors, pillars and stairs were created and maintained from the same mixture of volcanic stone and glass, the entire room an onyx pool glistening with undulating with waves of flickering firelight.

An aberrant blue light emanating from cracks in the stone added a bit of luminance to the austere darkness while firelight radiated from coal sconces placed about the edges of the room, hidden away in dark alcoves and cramped little windows of stone. However, their meager offerings paled in comparison to the basin of fire that dominated the center of the room. The outstretched vessel housed a violent orange, red fire desperately clawing towards the hidden darkness of the vaulted ceiling above.

Carved into the stone a few feet from the two polar sides of the fire basin, glowed two twin circles. Though the stone around their edges was un-marred, a perfectly glistening surface of dark stone, the interior of the circles was scarred with countless years of cracks, gashes and a delicate network of shatter marks, which had been judiciously filled by a strange glittering resin.

Despite its central position and an overabundance of space, the central floor was almost completely devoid of figures. Most of the watching eyes, ranging from green to gold, peered silently from the top of the stairs with overzealous curiosity while bending backwards into the shadows hoping to remain unnoticed.

As it was, there were only five figures occupying the center floor, standing just at the base of the stairs toeing the border of the leftmost circle. Two of the figures were clad from head to foot in glorious plated armor which from its massive weight bent the backs on which it sat. Massive horns curved from the tops of their helmets, and sharp spikes jutted from their shoulders matching the brutal spikes and jutting curves of their war staves. Both were over nine feet tall, one a regal creature with a protruding head and muted golden carapace which glittered mesmerizingly in the light of the fire, or any fire that managed to reach him under his layers of armor. From either shoulder a liquid sheet of golden fabric, to match his carapace, fell in a heavy stream towards the floor shifting silkily as he moved.

His companion stood with legs planted heavily against the floor, back curved, with a brutal expression hinting at barely restrained violence. In the light of the fire, her nebulous purple carapace was somewhat muted, but the ragged purple of a single shoulder cape, tattered from years of combat made clear her worth.

Atop the stairs, the colorful but somewhat muted standard was made clear as most of the onlookers wore far less extravagant armor, and bore no colorful finery. The accompanying three figures in the center of the room were similarly clad, one a delicate shade of orange, another a somewhat muted green, and another, a rather foggy brown color.

They waited in silence as the minutes passed on.

From somewhere in the darkness, the soft pad of footsteps could be heard, but no one bothered to acknowledge the figures as they stepped onto the floor at the opposite end of the room. Compared to the others about the room, it was clear these were well past their prime, with bent backs, and many, many scars. Some shuffled barely able to stand, while others walked with a solemn confidence, their eyes staring vacantly forward. They stopped at the edge of the opposite polar circle.

Around the room, silence reigned, but for the crackling babble of the fires. It continued for a short eternity until, finally, the hush was shattered by the clatter of steel on stone. Heads were lifted and with the clattering of armor the onlookers quietly turned towards one of the shadowy hallways. From it's depths, the sound continued until a form materialized from the darkness.

She was an imperious figure of consummate grace and power, her pearlescent armor clearly demonstrating her exalted ranking. Tongues of golden firelight flicked shards of radiance off the opalescent armor before fracturing into a million rays of color which spilled down her body forcing the closest observers to look away.

Human vision could behold this glorious image, but with the addition of ultraviolet perception the crowd was forced to look away from the luminous figure as she glided across the stone. Even without the armor, she would have been a celestial figure. A human would have looked upon her and assumed her body flickered like a mirage, taking in surrounding color and then reflecting it back in strange undulating patterns. But to a Drev she practically glowed with an array of prismatic color, scattering, warping and churning about her body, and if that were not enough her height proclaimed her status.

While the most imposing Drev reached nine to ten feet tall, she towered at an imposing height of ten feet eleven inches. She was, in fact, the most beautiful creature to grace Anum's surface in over a thousand years, blessed by the spirits with beauty and fighting prowess.

Prisma, Sentinel of the Citadel paused at the center of the leftmost circle surrounded as she was by a loose semi circle of council members; including the Magnate, his two acolytes, and the two high generals.

"May your steel be sharp, and may the fire light your path in the dark."

Voices murmured the ancient greeting back to her with heads lowered in deference.

Even her voice was beautiful, powerful, strong and commanding. The kind of voice that would be heard for miles over the plane of battle, and from it's ringing notes the entire room shivered collectively as they heard her power.

The Sentinel planted her war staff against the cold black glass silently giving permission for the Magnate to take charge of the meeting. He did so with a straight back despite his age. Once upon a time the Magnate had been one of the greatest clan warriors in recited history. A carapace of once glorious silver, bent with age, years of war, and a horrible injury blackened to the foggy brown. He was the oldest figure in the room, even compared to those standing opposite in the other polar circle. Age for the Drev was both a blessing and a curse. Age robbed the body of its strength but accumulated the mind with knowledge. It became a delicate balance within the warrior to determine how long they would live, when did skill or knowledge diminish to the point that a warrior was no longer worthy or useful.

"Warriors of Omphalos, we gather together today in reverence to the spirits above and below." Despite his age, the Magnate's voice echoed powerfully about the chamber enveloping the room with his presence, "Today on the eve of the seventeenth moon we offer a choice." The room turned as the Magnate did, watching him as he strode powerfully across the intervening space between the circles, passing the bowl of fire and standing before the group of elder Drev bent by their age and devoid of armor.

"Today you will be given a choice to prove your worth for this clan, or to offer yourself as a sacrifice to the spirits." Behind him, the acolytes burst into motion. One held a bowl in his hands, while the other prodded the roaring fire with a set of metal tongs. As the room watched they retrieved several still blazing embers from the fire and placed them, smoldering, into the bowl. One held the bowl, while the other retrieved a crude metal spear which had been leaning severely against the fire bowl.Both returned to stand behind their master, heads lowered, faces and eyes obscured by cowls of coarse, dark cloth.

Raising his hand to the acolytes, the Magnate stepped to the side. "Choose your fate, embers from the celestial fires and an immediate embrace into the home of the gods or," he motioned to the spear, "take up your weapons and fight on the front lines. Die so that others might live, or live and prove your place in the citadel as an acolyte." He raised his hands towards the ceiling, "but remember this: if you choose the fire, but shirk the path you have chosen you will be an outcast, a blight, a disease upon us, and you will never be allowed on clan soil. Even our enemies will shirk your presence knowing what you have done."

The room shivered with the exclamation.

"Choose wisely," the magnate muttered, motioning with a large sweeping gesture of his hands towards the two acolytes and their proffered offerings.

The room grew quiet as the magnate stepped to the side leaving the path clear for the elder Drev to step forward and make their choice. And they did so in silence; most had already made their decision walking slowly forward without hesitation as they took up the spear and bowed to the acolyte who held it on the opposing polar side. The vast majority of the elders chose the spear, gripping the stiff steel rod with a hard, cold conviction born from a lifetime of continual warfare.

But there was one. She was old, debilitated and shrunken from years of battle, twisted by age and washed of all color. Her gait was halting and stiff as she moved up the stone, the natural movement clearly causing her great pain. She paused before the two acolytes, head down in deep contemplation.

The room was silent.

The moment hung for many long minutes before she raised her wizened head, reached out a hand and plucked a fiery ember from the bowl on the left. As the fire's heat made contact with her skin, it sizzled and hissed sending acrid smoke upwards and into the darkness of the vaulted ceiling. Her face remained still and emotionless without a hint of searing pain.

The room was filled with a hissing, a muttering of surprise and reverence.

The Sentinel, quiet until now, stepped forward in all her dazzling glory. The wizened warrior lowered her head in deference, but was stopped.

"Hail devoted one, lift your eyes, for the spirits will accept you soon as an exemplar to our people. During the light of our next moon, you venture to the fire of your choice."

"Yes, my sentinel," she whispered, and was whisked away into the dark to be prepared and purified for her sacrifice.

As she vanished, the room's murmuring grew again as the watching crowd shifted. Preparing to leave they were stopped with the loud crack of staff on stone, and turning as one body they found the Sentinel and the Magnate standing together at the border of the leftmost circle.

"Stay in your places for the time being, for we have a pressing matter to discuss." The room shifted back into place as the warriors settled in place."

The Magnate turned, supporting himself on the weight of his staff.

" General Lumnus, General Cosma, your child has survived past the lunar marker and may now be presented before the war council for acceptance into the clan."

The room broke into a cacophony of muttered whispers.

General Lumnus stepped forward into the light, where the entire room was finally able to see the small bundle cradled gently in his lower arms, but even as he stood he didn't remove the covering.

Together the Sentinel and the Magnate waited impatiently, "Go on general, present her to the clan so that she may be judged worthy of our ranks."

General Lumnus didn't move, but instead opened his mouth to speak, "My fellow warriors... I would love nothing more than to do just as you ask, but before I do... I must plead a favor from the council..."

The room was again filled with curious whispers. The Magnate lifted his chin in surprise, hinting at an underlying challenge.

General Cosma shot her battle partner a look, "Lumnus-" she hissed.

He stared her back down, "You choose this pyre Cosma, and we shall both burn on it." Ignoring her, he turned back to the council who looking on in surprise, "Forgive me, your glory, but I must ask that you give us a chance to explain ourselves before judgment."

Around the room eyes were beginning to narrow.

"What is the meaning of this, General?" The Magnate hissed.

"Show us the kit," the sentinel demanded.

General Lumnus raised his distressed yet regal head and complied by lifting the kit in his arms and pulling away the bundle that had covered her. It fell to the ground with an echoing whump, more cloth than should have been needed, and for good reason.

A gasp of shock and horror rose up around the room as Lumnus raised the child into the light proffering the tiny, groggy form to the light of the fire. Over the last month her delicate plate armor had fused and darkened to a beautiful lightning blue tinged with lighter impressions, like the waters of their inland seas.

While unbelievable beautiful she was... so...small.

"What is the meaning of this Cosma?" hissed the Magnate. "This is embarrassing. That abomination should have been cast into the fire when it was born."

General Lumnus drew the tiny creature to his chest protectively, "She survived the lunar marker, and despite her size, she is strong ... and beautiful."

"She is a runt!"

General Cosma stepped back as if she had been slapped. Lumnus rumbled angrily down deep in his chest. The kit squirmed in Lumnus's large, outstretched hand, small enough that he could hold her with a single palm. The tiny mouth opened like a baby bird wide and pink as she yawned sleepily. Two golden eyes blearily blinked open as her legs and arms began to flail. The tiny creature squirmed and wriggled, but the cry she let off was powerful, echoing to the very spires and disappearing into darkness.

"You hear that," Lumnus urged, "she IS strong, she IS worthy. Just give her a chance. I know she can prove herself." A muttering mushroomed around them. Words of disapproval and dismay slithered through the air like a parasitic infection wiggling its way into the minds of those unsure.

Lumnus stood against the tide of hostility, battered but steadfast as he continued to hold the tiny squirming kit to the light. General Cosma remained still her head bowed, detached and seemingly disinterested in the fate of her own young.

"General Cosma, what is the meaning of this?" The Magnate demanded, and for the first time in so many minutes, she finally raised her head.

Two gold eyes blinked coldly from the darkness of her visor. "I failed my duty," she replied stiffly.

"NO!" Lumnus rejected, "Cosma -" He turned to the Magnate in frustration. "She doesn't know what she's saying, your glory. I have watched the moon rise and fall a thousand times since Cannon was born. We have lost son after son, daughter after daughter, and now this one lives, and after all we have done for the clan you would reject our desire to keep what we managed to conceive. Have you no respect for who we are and what we have done?"

His diatribe was cut off by a thundering crack of steel against stone, "We are not responsible for you genetic dysfunction, Lumnus. You two may be strong, and your first son was promising, but since then your bloodline has proven to be weak. Your honor, your sacrifice, your conquest means nothing here."

"Then why should we not cast you into the fire for your ailment?" Lumnus solicited quietly.

The Magnate grew very still, "What?" His voice was quiet and sharp like the scratch of a blade against porous stone.

Lumnus straightened, "I said why do we not cast you into the fire for your disfigurement?" When no one dared speak he continued, "My daughter may not be an adequate size, but the spirits have gifted her with the color of blue fire and lightning."

No one spoke for the longest moment, until the Sentinel stepped forward into the light, again dazzling the room with her beauty. Slowly she crossed the circle and stopped before Lumnus. He stepped back protectively, but she raised a consoling hand, tilting her head to look down at the kit nestled happily against her father's warm skin.

She ran a digit delicately over the kit's cheek. The little face turned towards her palm, and four grasping hands reached upwards clasping tight about the Sentinel's fingers. Slowly, she raised her hand, and the kit came with, clinging desperately to Prisma's hand with the power of it's four tiny limbs.

Reluctantly Lumnus let her go as the Sentinel took the kit into her arms looking down at the tiny face with the same loving nature that her very own mother should have looked on her, "She is quite beautiful ...."

Lumnus lifted his head, a glimmer of hope radiated from his eyes.

"It is a pity she is thus disfigured. Guards restrain him!"

"NO!" Lumnus lunged forward, but their response was too quick for him to rescue his daughter. Heavily-armored guards leapt down the stairs, grabbing him by his arms. He fought wildly for the first few seconds, but a sudden spear butt to the back of his knee sent him painfully to the ground.

"COSMA!" His call was desperate and pleading, but she made no move to aid him stiffening instead, against his pleading cries.

A spear to his throat, one to his back, surrounded by no less than five guards ... for they would need that many subdue the general and father.

The Sentinel ignored his cries walking across the open circle and towards the flickering ribbons of the central fire. Sensing something wrong the kit began to squirm and issue powerful chirps of fear and confusion.

Lumnus fought harder, but a spear point digging into the soft part of his throat choked his cries.

With a swift flick of her wrist the Sentinel upended the kit dangling it by one foot over the roaring flames. The powerful cries of fear had now turned into screams of pain as fire and heat licked at the delicate skin.

"COSMA, HELP HER!" The cry was powerful, rattling through the stone and causing the ground to quake with it's anguish. Eyes turned imploringly to his mate, but Cosma refused to look at him hunching inwards against herself. Lumnus's heart grew cold.

A bellow of anguish wrenched itself from his throat, long and tormented, "Sunny, no...."

The Sentinel stopped, the kit continued to ferociously wriggle and scream over the open flame.

"What did you say?" she probed.

Lumnus sagged towards the floor. "Sunny, her name is Sunny," his voice was a desperate whisper yet agony echoed up into the rafters where it grew stale and cold.

The room was alive with whispers.

"You NAMED this abomination!" The sentinel demanded. "She wasn't to be named until the first lunar marker. You know that."

He stared defiantly forward, "The spirit of the sun has sustained her."

"You have made our work much harder here, Lumnus, for discarding a named kit is not so easy as an unnamed one, but you violated the rules first." Sunny screamed and wailed in agony as the Sentinel dropped her lower towards the fire.

Lumnus roared in anger lunging forward and throwing four of the five guards to the ground with a sudden surge of anger. He thundered across the floor hand drawn, readying for a killing blow.

"STOP! Don't make your son suffer the consequences."

Lumnus stopped mid circle looking up to find Cannon, his son, held with a spear point to his throat. The young Drev was wide-eyed with confusion and pain as the two guards mercilessly drove him to his knees, "Father - " The youngling called in confusion. "Mother - " Cosma looked up now, reacting for the first time since they had stepped onto the floor.

"Lumnus," she warned. "Know your place. I will not lose my son today."

A shadow passed over Lumnus's face, "But you would watch your daughter burn?" His voice was cold and quiet. Cannon groaned in pain under the merciless treatment by the two guards. "It's – alright – father - help her." The young Drev was rapped swiftly over the head with the end of a spear butt, lurching forward painfully with a cry of shock.

The benevolence of his son's words drove Lumnus to his knees trapped between the breath of his two children. How could he choose between them? Answer was, he couldn't. He couldn't make that sort of choice.

The four guards he had thrown off earlier surrounded him once again making it clear they would not fail in their assignment again.

For now, the Sentinel had pulled Sunny away from the flames eyeing Lumnus and Cosma critically, "For one who failed to throw her crippled child into the fire, you don't seem concerned, Cosma."

The general lifted her head, eyes cold and steely with only a shard of shame. "It was a moment of weakness. I have since recognized my error."

The Sentinel brushed a finger over the Kit's cheek, "Clearly not enough to return and do what you should have done when she was born."

Cosma lowered her head.

With the kit cradled in her arms, the Sentinel looked towards the Magnate, "What say you, old one, what shall be done? The child is named and it would be displeasing to the spirits were we to deal with her as if she were not."

The Magnate nodded his head stiffly looking down at the child with an expression of unconcealed disgust. The tiny kit wriggled and cried with the fiery pain that still ached in her tiny limbs.

"Please - " Lumnus begged weakly, "Please...."

Somewhere in the darkness Cannon choked against the spear at his throat.

The Sentinel lifted her beautiful head towards the ceiling, eyes shrouded, head tilted as if she was listening. Slowly her head lowered and her eyes released, "I may..... just have the answer."

The room was as silent as a stony tomb, and not but the echoing of heavy armor reflected off the distant recesses of the ceiling. "We shall deal with her like all those named who are disfigured with injury or old age." With one sweeping gesture of her scepter, she motioned to the two static acolytes, still standing with the spear and respective bowl of coals, to come forward into the circle.

"No!" Lumnus protested, "You can't, she's just a child, she doesn't understand!"

"Silence yourself!" The Magnate spat, and the fifth guard clamped a hand about Lumnus's muzzle silencing him with impunity. He struggled, but was forcibly kept silent.

Together, the two acolytes gently knelt and placed their offerings on the floor. The Sentinel crouched low and placed the kit on the floor before backing away.

The floor itself was cool, the cold soothing Sunny's burning skin, a soft chirping replacing the powerful cries. Her tiny beak turned this way and that searching desperately for comfort, but the Magnate and Sentinel blocked her view. The chirping grew more earnest and pleading, and together, they all waited for the kit to make a move.

The kit inched across the ground and away from the looming figures overhead, but she was corralled with only one way out. The chirping had died into a sort of piteous moaning, but Sunny crawled onwards coming to a stop just before the spear and the bowl.

Somewhere in the room Lumnus scrambled, silent against his captors. The hall was a tomb, cold and silent and breathless. General Cosma turned away from the scene.

Mesmerized by the glowing embers, Sunny scooted forward, golden eyes bright and glittering. The Magnate readied himself to scoop up the child and prepare her for sacrifice.

Lumnus moaned against his silenced mouth and struggled even harder. All five of the guards strained to pin him to the floor, and even then his power was almost too much for them to counter.

With one tiny hand Sunny reached outwards as if to pick up one of the embers, but as soon as the kit's hand neared the outside of the bowl she recognized the painful heat of the stone, chirped in fear and began to crawl away, instead placing her tiny hands on the cold metal of the spear. With a soft cry she curled into a ball face pressed against the cold steel to soothe the aching, for no mercy could be found from the dark and looming figures above her.

The Magnate stood straight and lifted his head to the sky above, "The spirits have spoken." Looking down towards the small sapphire kit he continued, "The child will be allowed to remain in the clan. She will prove her worth through battle and likely die by the blade."

With a sharp click, he motioned the acolytes into movement.

The embers were cast into the fire, and the spear was whisked away into the darkness. The Sentinel, together with the Magnate, turned with the soft swishing of fabrics and vanished into the darkness. As soon as their figures were no longer visible, the room broke into a cacophony of voices raising like a tsunami towards the pinnacle of the ceiling. Hidden within the madness was a patchwork of anger, confusion, disapproval, pity, and sadness.

The spear was withdrawn from Cannon's throat, and he was allowed to slump onto his hands and knees coughing and moaning. A few of the Drev soldiers knelt to see if he was injured.

Lumnus was finally released from his captive position, and as soon as he was able to move freely, he scrambled across the floor to where Sunny was still curled chirping piteously in pain. "Sunny ... Sunny I... I'm so sorry." Delicately, and with his lower set of hands, he picked her up off the floor cradling her protectively against his midriff.

Sensing someone familiar, the kit began to whimper and chirp fervently.

"Shh, I'm here. I'm here. I'm so sorry." His voice was quiet, barely a rasp above a whisper.

A few of the soldiers stayed behind to watch the drama unfold, but many had turned their backs and were walking out the doors in orderly lines. Cannon struggled to his feet watching with wide eyes as the others trickled through the doors leaving his father and mother the only ones left standing on the floor below.

Lumnus had opened his mouth to speak to Cosma, but upon seeing Cannon, he changed his mind, "Return to your practice, son. I will speak to you soon.

"But, father -"

"Please Cannon," the young Drev did not argue, but couldn't help but look over his shoulder as he exited through the wide double doors.

When they were finally alone, Lumnus turned on Cosma, face twisted into an expression of rage. Cosma stood still with her back to him, his eyes flashing a confusing mixture of disappointment, anger, confusion, and something approaching disdain.

"How.... could.... you?" he whispered hoarsely.

Cosma didn't look at him, and the room was silent but for the kit's whimpering

"You - shame me, Cosma."

His words struck like prongs of glass buried in the skin. She turned suddenly, golden eyes alight with anger, "NO, you shame yourself, if you had just-"

He cut her off, "NO I WILL NOT TAKE THIS FROM YOU! You made a choice that day Cosma, you chose to let her live, and I supported your decision because we paired. And now, now that we finally have what we want, you want to destroy it because you are a coward. I know what you are doing, you're taking out your own weakness on her, and I will-not-have-it."

Two golden capes billowed behind him as he stormed past her, stopping short he turned his head in her direction trying to make eye contact. His words were so soft that they barely registered over the cracking fire, not hiding the horrible power of his anger. "As a battle pair, we made an oath to protect, defend and honor one another, but now, in my time of greatest need you abandoned me...and now I find myself wishing...... that I had never stepped into that circle."

Somewhere in the darkness, a single pocket of moisture was caught by the fire, popping violently with a great shedding of sparks.

Embers floated in the air for a moment, like bright red stars in the night sky, only to fade back into their evanescent embers and vanish.

***

Dr. Krill struggled valiantly to keep up with the human's impossibly long strides. From his vantage point, behind and slightly to the side of the human, he watched in great fascination the rolling lines of muscle flexing smoothly from the very tips of the human's fingers, up his arms, across his shoulders, down his back, into his legs, and finally terminating at the digits of the feet not unlike watching a rolling wave break across an ocean shoreline.

The Doc became very aware of his own disjointed scuttling in comparison to the human's fluid, predatory movement. In all honesty, Krill couldn't understand how the human moved so gracefully. Even those species in the universe that could perform bipedal movement were incapable of standing on their own. The Rundi, for instance, were known for their superior running abilities using their own momentum to keep them upright as they ran, but when standing in place they used their unusually lengthy arms and fingertips to balance themselves against the floor. The Tesraki COULD walk on two legs, but were forced to use a large, stabilizing tail to keep them from tipping over.

This human, on the other hand, was capable of standing still, running, walking and even balancing on one foot without the aid of a tail or hands. It shouldn't have been possible, especially when you considered that the human's center of gravity, or at least this human's center of gravity was just below the chest making him arguably top heavy, and mechanically likely to fall flat on his face with all the grace and poise of a rockslide, but then again perhaps that explained the grace of his movement. If you want to balance on such precarious footing, it would make sense that every muscle, joint, and tendon in the body should be used to its full capacity. With his critical and scientific eye, Krill stared at the human's feet watching as the joint flexed subtly against the floor to compensate for balance. The arms moved in a swaying pendulum-like rhythm back and forth and back and forth stabilizing the core of the body as weight was moved from one side to the other. Despite the back and forth movement of the hips and shoulders, the head remained almost still. Of course with this particular human, this ability was even more impressive considering the use of an analogue limb, the right leg, and monocular vision which would dramatically impair depth perception.

The human took a sharp corner, and Krill, focusing closely on his feet was distracted enough that he almost ran into the edge of an exposed pipe.

Hearing him falter, the human turned to look, "You should probably avoid braining yourself on the first day of work, you see I got this new doctor, and he's a bit of a novice when it comes to neurosurgery. I wouldn't trust him."

Krill stared at the human in puzzlement trying to piece together the facial expression that had molded itself into place over the human's incredibly mobile face: one of the fuzzy lines above his eye raised, the mouth pulled tight tilted upwards at one corner, a slight rotation of the head, "Wait, Human, I thought you just said I was the new doctor."

The human stared at him for a very long moment, and his expression slowly morphed; the corner of the mouth dropped and the fuzzy line above the left eye raised even higher, if that were possible. After a moment he sighed, and Krill watched as his eye rolled upwards momentarily, flashing the moist white underbelly spiderwebbed with glittering red veins. Krill took a step back in disgust. He hadn't seen a human do that before.

When the human finally spoke his voice was slower than normal, which confused Krill even more. "Yes, doctor, that was..... the point."

He stared blankly on, "I don't understand."

"I was kidding..... joking.... jesting.... messing with you.... utilizing verbal irony to make light of a situation."

More blank staring.

The human rattled his head back and forth in ... frustration? "Honestly, doc, your planet is as comically dry as the Sahara Desert. What do they do for fun there, pull teeth?"

"We don't have teeth, and you said desert twice?"

The expression the human made this time involved the slight parting of the lips, the tilting of the head and the scrunching of the muscles around the eyes, "Sahara..... right......" He sighed and shook his head again before turning around to continue walking.

Krill struggled to catch up, "Look doctor, if you are going to remain aboard this ship, with humans, I think your first lesson is going to have to be on humor because my friend, yours is severely lacking. I mean, it's honestly a crime against humanity."

Krill almost ran into another pipe.

"I don't mean like a real crime doc, and stop walking so close to the wall, you're making me nervous." He turned another corner, "Lesson number one for living with humans is the use of irony or humor."

"What is... this word.... it does not translate well."

The human hummed deep in his chest rubbing the back of his head and neck as if trying to message the thoughts to the forefront of his mind, "There are different kinds of irony situational, dramatic, but the most important one is verbal. Verbal irony is when you say one thing but mean something else."

Krill looked at him incredulously, "Why would you do something like that? The confusion, the misinterpretation in communication would be problematic and cause chaos."

The human waved a dismissive hand at him, "Cool your jets doc, most humans know when you're using irony. Then of course, there is sarcasm which is similar to irony but has some slight differences. We use all this in conjunction with exaggeration, and teasing. In the case of my joke earlier, I talked to you about you as if you weren't you, and then I used irony to imply you were bad at brain surgery even though you aren't, since you performed mine, before finishing off by pointing out, not untruthfully but not meanly, that you are the only doctor on this ship and probably wouldn't be able to help yourself if you were injured.... make sense?"

Krill had four cortical hemispheres which could operate independently of each other, was the highest ranked medical professional in the galaxy, spoke (or at least understood) eight languages other than his own, and yet he stood here feeling like an absolutely massive imbecile.

Krill was NOT used to feeling unintelligent.

"You didn't understand a word I said, did you? So much for being a genius eh, doc."

"I'll have you know that-!"

He was cut short as the human threw his hands into the air with a cry of frustration "I was teasing! Sheesh, I didn't mean it."

Krill paused, eyeing the human, "Was that more of your... irony?"

"Yeah see, now you're getting it. I implied that you weren't a genius even though I know you are."

"And your species actually completed peace talks with the GA?" Krill wondered incredulously.

A bright green eye fixed on him, "You know, I would have said that was funny if I didn't know you were serious."

"So it is only humorous if it's not serious or in jest?"

"No it can be serious, but either the intention has to be funny, or the people listening to it have to find it funny."

"What makes something funny?"

The human looked at him, opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again and then gave a frustrated growl. The noise, to Krill was rather unpleasant, deep, so deep that it was almost below the register of his hearing and shook the air around the human like the rumbling of a rockslide. "Something is funny if..... you say one thing and mean another especially if that thing is exaggerated to the very opposite. It's funny if..... the situation is tense or you're afraid and you need to ease the tension. It's funny if its unbelievable, or unfortunate and its either laugh or cry. It's funny if it's true, but abnormal or unusual. It's also funny if it's out of context.. It's funny if it's unbelievably stupid, but not too stupid because sometimes stupid things can also be sad, but it can also be sad, funny and stupid at the same time."

"I'm sorry..... you actually communicate.... like this ... effectively?" Krill wondered in confusion.

"I could give you examples and situations, but it would probably be best and easiest if you just observe for a while. Also, don't try it without adult supervision because if you don't know what you're doing or depending on the audience, it could go very, very wrong and then you're in a pile of shit before you know it," the captain explained.

The Vrul didn't get headaches, but it was possible for his species to receive cortical overload. Right now he was trying to parse out the language, remember the terms the human was using, translating the definitions into more precise language while puzzling out the facial expressions which seemed to be more complicated than their oral terminology. He decided instead that it would just be prudent to agree with the human for a time. He had a feeling that upsetting a human was not something he should, even unintentionally, do.

He thought his knowledge about the humans was limited but he was quickly learning that he knew even less. One informational item he had gleaned was that this particular specimen, the alpha human, was easiest to deal with when in a "happy state" characterized by a quick, and almost spring-like step, a "smile," and extreme talkativeness. As it turned out the occasional, "Oh really, of course, or tell me more," was enough to keep the human talking for as long as one needed to think. Perhaps Krill would miss some of what the human was saying, but the human was not likely to notice and Krill used the extra time to process. Krill would have put "social awareness" at the bottom of the human's ability list. It got confusing when he would have put "social savviness" at the top of that same list.

The human cut off mid sentence, coming to a halt before a double-wide set of doors just beside the intersection of two hallways. The humans that walked by made no pretense when staring at Krill and the captain, but mostly Krill. The way they looked ranged from narrowed eyes to tilted heads, and Krill could feel the panic rising inside him again. What had he gotten himself into?

The Captain elbowed a small square of metal beside the door, which depressed and caused the doors to open with a metallic hiss. The environment around them was enveloped in a stark bright light, and a murmur of deliberate human voices. The captain motioned him forward through the doors which shut with a soft snick behind them.

The room or set of rooms that Krill had entered was clearly a product of greater effort than the rest of the ship. Like the bridge, there were no exposed pipes, no open metal, or dim fluorescent light from above. The walls and floors were covered with a light grey almost white surface, the color also adorning the furniture and machinery.

Occasionally, the room sported some other color, usually in the pastel range of blues and greens. The humans themselves were dressed to match their environment, most in light green, one or two in light blue, and at least one in dark blue. That human ordered the rest around with obvious authority.

Examining the room itself, well... it was a complete disaster. If someone expected him to practice medicine here, then they were in for a bit of a shock. There was no logical positioning of machinery or the placement of the furniture. The people moved with the same chaotic confusion they had done in the cargo bay. They talked over one another, and past one another causing serious distraction within the environment. Not to mention that he did not spot ONE sterilization field, or even a place that would dispense the proper sterilization hoods.

IF he were to practice medicine here, it would be like practicing medicine during the second solar season of their planet's history when medical practice included one thing and one thing only, dying a horrible, excruciating death.

During Krill's examination of the room, the human had left him to fend for himself and wandered off to examine one of the machines, walking around it with great curiosity. He lifted a finger to touch it, when his hand was slapped away by the human wearing dark blue, "AH, keep your hands off my equipment, kid."

This human's voice was higher in the register than the captain's, signifying the female of the species Krill concluded, her hair was long and dark, her skin was lightly tanned, and her eyes were ringed with a delicate webbing of wrinkles where the skin had lost its elasticity.

The captain snatched back his hand with a yelp and a grin, "Good morning, doc."

"Good morning my ass, and don't call me doctor. I'm a PA, a physician's assistant. A physician's assistant without a physician to assist, mind. You trying to keep this ship and its crew from falling apart. Do you know how many doctors this ship is supposed to have?" The human didn't give time for the captain to answer. "TWO, the chief medical officer and the second attending physician. And you know how many PAs we are supposed to have? FOUR. But no, we have no doctor, one PA, and a crew full of rambunctious idiots, even if we discount yourself who is the biggest, most reckless idiot of them all," she snarled.

Krill stepped back against the strength of her anger, but the captain just continued to smile. "And I was just about to compliment you on the incredible job you have been doing."

"Stop trying to kiss my ass, it isn't sanitary," she paused just then. "What the hell is that on our face?"

"Oh... oh... I know this one, my face skin."

"Ha ha you are adorable, I mean this," she pointed dismissively at the eyepatch.

The captain shrugged, "A new wardrobe accessory, makes me look dashing, don't you think?"

"Makes you look like a dipshit," she pushed him back forcing him to sit on the edge of one of the beds. Ignoring his protests, she pulled off the patch and grabbed his face to examine the eye,

"Rmmmffff."

"This isn't even bandaged! What kind of hillbilly backwater hell hole facility did you go to?" The human's single remaining eye slanted sideways towards Krill.

"Well that's what I've been trying to tell you, I brought you a new attending physician. The best in the galaxy."

Krill was suddenly aware of an entire room of eyes on him, including the cold brown eyes of the physician's assistant standing over him with her hands on her hips. Her feet were spread at shoulder width for balance, her core was exposed, but her chin was tucked down over her neck and she did not look pleased. Aggressive and hostile were the first words that came to Krill's mind, so he scuttled back a little.

"What kind of doctor doesn't know how to pack a wound and where the hell is the replacement? You know the bone structure won't hold up without something in there."

Despite her alarming hostility, Krill felt.a slight surge of anger at her questioning, "Watch your tone with me, human. I performed the surgery that removed the object, and if you look closer you will find that I used that time to shore up the orbital structure around the inside of the socket seeing as I have no access to artificial eyes in my facility. Furthermore, if we are to be working together, I will require the proper respect that is due my station. If you have any issues, I am sure we can find a proper assignment for you; these floors could use a good sterilization."

The captain opened his mouth to speak, but the PA cut him off, "Is this bug just screwing with me, or is he really telling the truth?"

"He has absolutely no sense of humor, but he works a mean scalpel."

The PA remained quiet for a moment examining the man's wound, "The bug wasn't lying about his work. We wouldn't want to ruin that pretty face of yours." She patted him on the cheek rather aggressively before turning away to grab her equipment. The captain rubbed the side of his face.

"Ouch, has anyone ever told you you need to work on your bedside manner?"

"Boy, the sick people I work with are military and the last thing they want is cuddles, now, tilt your head back." The captain did as ordered, and the PA turned her predatory eyes upon Krill, "Take a look around."

Krill did as suggested as the woman redressed the patch over captain's eye. The rest of the medical staff looked on in curiosity and worry. He was very short compared to them, and surely quite alien. But to be fair, he didn't much fancy the look of them either, scary, scary but fascinating at the same time, much like a horrendous accident.

He wasn't impressed by the setup they had. It was all very primitive; the sterilization techniques were sub-par at best, and the operating suite was practically a torture chamber. This was unacceptable.

He returned just as the PA was finishing up, placing a white gauze pad over the opening, "How's that?"

"Itchy," the Captain responded, pulling on his eyepatch to the chagrin of the PA. She was fighting a losing battle though and turned to look back at Krill. She raised one of those furry lines on her face. He was growing very tired of that expression, and he wasn't even entirely sure what it meant.

He took it as an opportunity to speak, "An absolute disaster. I am impressed that your species has survived for so long using such rudimentary equipment and procedures. If I am to work here things will change to meet my specification, starting with the operating suite. This entire setup has no logical procession, the medical equipment is antiquated, and the standards to which you sterilize your equipment is practically barbaric. I would require all the updated medical equipment that I deem necessary, and maybe then will I be able to operate comfortably."

It was just then he became aware of how very quiet the room had become. The humans stood in a large, loose semicircle staring at him with incredulity, and a might bit of hostility. The captain was the only one who didn't seem concerned. He had scooted backwards on the hospital bed hands behind his head; ankles crossed. He absently scratched below the eyepatch as he sat watching, clearly content to observe rather than get involved.

"Can I get you some popcorn, Captain?" The PA hissed, though her eyes never turned from Krill. The doctor had the feeling that she was using irony, since her expression demonstrated no hint of friendliness.

"No, I'm alright, please continue. I am here in a purely observational capacity," he punctuated his invitation by adjusting the pillow.

The PA didn't acknowledge him, instead walking forward crouching down to Krill's eye level. For a moment he was distracted by the feat of balance she performed, resting on only the balls and digits of her feet. He was somewhat less distracted when she caught his gaze. The eyes themselves were almost completely and, unnaturally still. The pupils were wide black holes leading back into nothingness. Her sharp teeth were just inches from his face glittering with that delicate coating of digestive slime. She could rip him apart with her teeth if she really wanted too.

Her voice, partially hidden by the simultaneous translation was quiet and cold as shattered glass, "You may be "god" on your planet, but here, in my medical bay, you are only as good as your actions, and so far I hear a lot of talking but I'm not seeing much action. If you're who I think you are, you weren't aware brain surgery was a thing a month ago." She stood lifting her chin in a challenging posture towards him, "You are going to see things you never imagined, deal with things that seem impossible, who knows, you may decide to leave eventually. Maybe you won't be able to hack it, but one thing is for sure, you don't know what the hell you're doing."

He stayed silent.

"So sit back, shut up, and learn, and maybe you and I will manage to get along."

The intervening stillness was broken when the captain rolled off the bed and leaped to his feet. Rubbing his hands together, "Excellent, now that the pleasantries are over, we can continue on with the tour." He turned to the woman, "Why don't you call in to the UNSC and see if we can't get some of those extra PAs you were talking about?" He patted her pleasantly on the shoulder as if unaware of her sour expression and glower that could have bored holes through his forehead.

He hurried across the room and ushered Krill through the doors just as the rest of the medical staff was beginning to move. As soon as they were through the doors, the smile fell from the Captain's face and he grew serious, hurrying the doctor up the hall.

"Lesson number two," he muttered.

"Try not to be a dick."

.


	17. Chapter 17

On December 10, 1954 human male by the name of Dr. John Paul Stapp volunteered for an experiment in which he was propelled horizontally down a track by nine rockets reaching the equivalent of 40,000 lbs of thrust. During the experiment he accelerated from standstill to 630 mph within five seconds reaching 20 Gs before coming to a complete stop within 1.4 seconds. During that time he experienced the equivalent of 46.2 G and his body was estimated to have weighed around 7,000 lbs at the point of greatest force. Against all that seemed possible, he survived the experiment with minor injuries including the complete hemorrhaging of both eyes, which he later recovered from and still maintained his vision with only minor lasting side effects. 

It is widely believed that the reason humanity was able to reach space so quickly compared to other sentient species was their ability to withstand extreme G- forces. For clarification, the average human can withstand 5 Gs of force before passing out while the average alien may loose consciousness around 3.5 Gs

_

A low, early morning sun lorded over the North Carolina coastline, painting the surrounding sky with a bold wash of red, orange and peach; untouched by the blemish of cloud cover. UN flags hung listlessly towards the ground motionless and still as the sun cast her reaching fingers across the ground.

The perfect day for flying.

Despite the usual stillness of the early morning, the tarmac of Fort Harmony was crawling with life. Men and women in ACU's and bright orange vests waving colorful markers ushered six F-90 Darkfires onto the tarmac, where the rising sun showered them in a cascade of early morning light.

Drops of early morning dew rolled off the wings of the six jets and spilled over onto the tarmac, like liquid gold.

An army-tan hover jeep rumbled over the distant landscape, kicking up dust in its wake and casting flecks into the early morning light. The jets were powered down just as the jeep cruised to a stop, bringing with it one corporal and one air force captain, who stepped from the jeep and onto the tarmac with the thud of heavy combat boots, unchanged in their design for the past thousand years, although the material incorporated advanced technology.

Two figures marched from the other side of the tarmac by the hangers, one reaching out to shake the captain's hand firmly, "Captain Palmer, glad you could make it,"

"As am I," he responded pleasantly, stepping into line with the other man and woman as they made their way across the airstrip. "What else can you tell me about the program? Some of my superiors are more than a bit skeptical."

The man to his direct left, Lieutenant by rank, turned expectantly to his superior, the woman, whose uniform patches marked her as a major.

"Of course, what exactly are your superiors' concerns?"

Captain Palmer raised his hand against the rising sun, "Well, on paper they're just kids."

The woman didn't seem concerned with his superiors' worries, passing by the nose of one of the jets and heading towards the hangers. "Our youngest cadet is at least 20 years old, and all of them have more than five years' experience in flight training."

"So, you pulled them out of school?" he speculated.

"From one school and into another I suppose. By the age of 18, most of them had equal to a bachelor's degree in aviation, a pilot's license, and the training required to continue further into the program. My cadets are some of the most well-trained aviators in the world and the vast majority of them are MORE than passable as foot soldiers."

Captain Palmer grunted skeptically, "That remains to be seen. I'll be stepping in for one of your instructors today. I want to personally see what your recruits can do."

"I'm more than confident they will be up to your superiors' standards." With her assurances made, she led him past a line of hangers and through a door into the dimly lit, concrete interior which echoed and thundered with voices amplified by the ribbed metal walls and ceiling.

She led him across the floor to where the group of 'cadets' was working, most kneeling, some cross-legged on the floor, inspecting and re-inspecting their flight gear. There were six of them all together, one for each jet, four young men and two young women. The woman brought them to an abrupt halt in front of one of the recruits who was kneeling before a large tarp lined with equipment, vigorously jotting down notes in a small, handheld notebook.

"Cadet Vir."

The young man turned to look up at them, large green eyes and messy blond hair, despite the crew- cut. Upon seeing the group he quickly scrambled to his feet, nearly tripping on the edge of the tarp before bringing himself to attention. Captain Palmer turned to look at the Major with one eyebrow raised as if to say, really this one? Her return flash told him to shut his damn mouth and trust her.

Scrutinizing the cadet, the captain noted he was around 6" 2' and probably 190 to 195 pounds fit, with broad shoulders and narrow hips. He still had a bit of a boyish face, but that was expected. The cadet had already donned the olive grey flight suit in preparation for the day.

"At ease, cadet," the woman said.

She stepped to the side of the tarp between the two of them, "Captain Palmer, this is Cadet Adam Vir, one of the first and youngest cadets to pass through the program. Cadet Vir, this is Captain Palmer, he has flown at least 1000 flights in his career, the vast majority of them being trans-atmospheric and will be the observing instructor on your flight today."

The boy held out a hand across the intervening space, "Captain Palmer, it'll be an honor to fly with you." The boy's grip was surprisingly strong.

Captain Palmer nodded to the notebook the young man still held in his left hand, "What's that?"

"This, sir?" He raised the book. "Preflight checklist. It helps me check things off."

Palmer nodded, "Good man, don't let me get in your way."

He didn't get in the way, but watched closely from a distance as the young man fitted his kit together. It didn't pay to have a pilot that neglected the pre-flight.

_

An hour later, they stepped from the hanger and out into a deluge of orange sunlight, the sun having risen over the distant horizon, and painted the tarmac with molten fire. Together, they cut an impressive figure, rigged with the leading edge in military flight technology which included but was not limited to polyester, neoprene, Gortex, Mylar, Normex, Dacron and Kevlar. As far as space suits went, they were far sleeker and more refined than the suits originally used to land on the moon; they had to be to fit into the cockpit, despite the full helmet, gloves, boots, G-resistant pants, and breathing apparatus.

The boy adjusted his helmet, and Captain Palmer could have sworn he heard the boy humming the theme music to "Top Gun." When he glanced over, the young man's face was plastered in a nervous mixture of barely-concealed worry, and a rather idiotic grin of excitement. The sun glinted in shades of orange and gold off his eyes.

Without hesitation, the cadet led him across the tarmac and towards the first plane in the line. Two ground technicians were waiting to assist with takeoff and pre-flight. The boy didn't even wait for a go ahead before beginning an examination of the aircraft, jotting notes in his little notebook as he went, desperately juggling his helmet and almost dropping it on one occasion.

"Do you mind holding this for me, Captain?" The boy asked sheepishly, proffering the helmet. The man took it in relief; glad that he wouldn't have to explain the loss of a five million dollar piece of equipment. Inside his head Cadet Vir was thinking the same thing as he climbed the ladder and released the canopy. He had done pre-flights like this hundreds of times now. He started a check of ejection systems, pulling pins and adjusting levers to his specifications. Another ladder had been brought around to the other side of the aircraft for the Captain, who slid into the rear seat with the practiced ease of a man who spent more time in the air than he did on the ground.

Adam slipped into the front seat, a tight fit but not too tight, and began with the set of buckles. One of the ground technicians stepped up the ladder to help him adjust the shoulder harnesses as he pulled the others into place with the satisfying click, click, click of in-flight safety. He then adjusted the oxygen mask over his mouth and nose, fitting it snuggly into place and making sure the coil didn't get caught in the helmet. That done, both men pulled on their helmets, listening and waiting for the soft hiss, accompanied by a pop in the ears as the suit closed into a completely pressurized system.

He adjusted a switch, waited for a light and then started the engine, allowing it to idle to twenty percent. Even inside his helmet the power of the engine was almost deafening. He adjusted a few more dials, checked the engine lights and fuel flow before slowly accelerating the engine to fifty-five percent. The roaring only grew louder, rattling his bones, but boy how he loved the awareness and pleasure of it all. He checked the controls, side mounted, instead of forward, using similar fly-by-wire systems jets had used for a thousand years. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

The sky outside was a pastel blue mutating towards eggshell as the sun continued to rise over them. Long shadows were cast out the side of the tarmac as he worked, watched from behind by Captain Palmer. Cadet Vir engaged the canopy, watching as it lowered slowly over his head and sides leaving him with almost 360 degrees of sight and a full console of controls to his front. The burning light of the sun was somewhat dampened by the polarized barrier, but he still lowered the internal visor of his helmet. The landscape darkened around him, taking on a strange orange tint.

"Internal radio check?"

"Loud and clear," came Palmer's reply, voice somewhat metallic over the line.

He moved onto the altimeter and altitude indicators, before moving across a familiar pattern of flight instruments, all reading as expected. Signals were passed, and the two ground technicians removed the wheel chocks.

Vir toggled the radio switch for ACT, "Clearance, Delta 1 trans-atmo novice flight to Lunar 1."

He released the button, listening for instructions, "Delta 1 cleared, depart runway 3 right."

The engines rumbled below him as he made a few minor adjustments before continuing his conversation with air traffic control. The skies would be clear for him today, at least near the ground.

"Delta 1 ready for taxi."

"Delta 1 roger, taxi 03 left, hold short of delta sierra"

"Roger, hold short at delta sierra." A familiar pressure grew, seriously? He had peed THREE times before putting on the suit. This ALWAYS happened. The ground began to move below him as he urged the jet into a slow taxi. The engines were somewhat more muffled than before, but still deafening, the simulations hadn't prepared him for that. Inside his suit, his palms were beginning to sweat. His breath was coming heavier than normal, and he had to take a few deep breaths to calm himself. A steady stream of cool air passed over his face from the mask.

"Delta 1 taxi into position 03 right."

"Roger, into position"

"Delta 1 clear to takeoff runway 3 left..." He barely heard the rest of the communication over the pounding in his chest. He momentarily squeezed his eyes shut taking a few more deep breaths before pushing the thrust lever forward feeling the power of the machine as it began to accelerate, slow at first, and then faster and faster and faster until he was being pressed back into his seat. The roaring of the engines seemed to dampen to a rumbling static that was hardly comparable to the screaming roar those on the ground must be hearing.

The plane rattled and bounced around them as if threatening to tear herself apart, but he kept steady, waiting as the power of lift became more than the power of gravity, and then ...pulled up. He felt as the landing gear left the runway and the rattling evened out until they were hurtling smoothly into the deepening blue sky above. His stomach momentarily dropped into his pelvis with an eruption of tingling before their speed evened out. Through his seat and flight suit, he felt the soft thud as the plane's landing gear retracted into position.

His heart slowed and his breathing evened out. His hands grew steady about the controls as he accelerated them into a vertical push. He could feel the G-force, the ground pulling at his body. Looking out the canopy he was vertical between both ground and sky. Ahead was only the darkening blue of a thinning atmosphere.

This was the most dangerous part of the journey, the transition into space. The atmosphere was holding them up now, but when there was none, the engines wouldn't be strong enough to make that last push into orbit. At Mach 2 they were not fast enough to reach escape velocity. Completely vertical now, he watched as their altitude gage climbed steadily and the horizon and sky began to blend together into a hazy white line as the curve of the earth became visible from inside the canopy. It grew in his vision expanding out towards infinity on his right and on his left like the unfurling wings of a massive mythical bird or celestial angel. Above him the clear eggshell blue of the sky's feathered underbelly deepened. The light of the sun condensed, and whitened growing hotter and hotter and sharper and sharper.

Warning lights began blinking next to the altitude gage. He let them go for the next few seconds, steeling himself for the next and most dangerous step. As hyper aware as he was at that moment, it seemed as if he could feel the very particles of air expanding inside his lungs as he took a breath, held it and then......

He cut the engine.

For a few precious moments, they were carried upward by the vestiges of their momentum and then for an instant suspended in space and time, hung between earth and sky in a bubble of surreal silence, blue blackness above them, distant blue-tinted ground behind them.

Then they began to fall.

He had not spent those precious seconds in idle contemplation. With a practiced flick of a dial and compression, he felt the familiar ca-chunk as the jet engine seamlessly switched places with a smaller more powerful thrust engine. The Victor class 62 fusion engine, so much power in such a small package that it was against military regulations to allow its deployment in the lower atmosphere.

They were gaining speed as they fell backwards, hurtling towards the ground and away from the blackness above, being quickly swallowed by the scattered blue light of the atmosphere.

With his right thumb, he toggled the gage for the fusion engine, and then with an intake of breath, pressed the hand-control forward. The response was like being fired from a gun. Inside the fusion engine, two hydrogen atoms collided, sending the jet they were in hurtling skyward. The sound it produced was nothing short of awesome. The screaming of heaven and hell roaring at their heels, threatening to rip them apart with celestial power if they didn't move fast enough.

His body rocked and rattled, his bones acting like maracas as they shot skyward. He could barely see as his eyes rattled inside his skull. Mach 1, Mach 2, Mach 3. The numbers climbed faster and faster as the Earth receded behind them. They reached Mach 33, traveling faster than a bullet. His entire body had gone numb with the power of the engines.

A thin ring of black threatened the corners of his vision and his legs grew numb as the suit's gear worked furiously to squeeze blood back into his head. As the darkness still threatened, he tensed the muscles in his stomach and chest, forcing the blood where he wanted it to go.

The curve of the Earth morphed from a flat horizon to a delicate parabola. The sky above blackened with each increasing second, and the sun brightened until, despite the protection of the canopy, the controls were lit up with a fiery white light, casting eerie shadows all around him. The sky above, no longer blue but a massive expanse of black touching the Earth's hazy, electric blue atmosphere that was, in that moment, the most beautiful color he had ever seen.

The Earth rolled behind him into the blackness, it's elegant curve growing tighter and tighter, the further they flew. Inside his chest, his heart hammered, his breath came in short, deep gasps. Behind him the last, visible, vestiges of Earth's blue-tinted atmosphere was tossed away like a cloak leaving him with nothing but the blackness above and the ground, a distant marble of blue glass, behind.

He toggled a switch on the outside of his glove and his pre-flight navigation plan popped into his helmet. He was nearing LEO (low earth orbit) and would slow there to gain a proper trajectory to the moon and make contact with inter-space ATC. He followed the plans to the letter cutting into LEO and reducing the engine's output capacity to match required orbiting speed around 17,150 mph. He completely cut the afterburners and allowed Newton's laws to do the work for him, coasting at required orbital speed and only firing the engines when course correction was needed. Aside from the distant rumbling of the engines, traveling through the structure of the jet, all else was totally silent and for the first moment he allowed his mind to fully comprehend where he was and what he was doing. Earth hung below him like a painted Christmas ornament, the sky above was black, and the sun was approaching it's zenith over Earth.

Out his right window was only darkness, a vast abyss of space stretching out beyond comprehensive eternity. He blinked hard against the prickling at the corners of his vision. His face, no his whole body, erupted in pins and needles. He felt as if he were about to cry, or scream or..... or laugh. He chose the latter. It started in his chest bubbling upwards through his throat and past his lips in gleeful exaltation. His heart was going to rupture.

From the rear seat Captain Palmer listened to the young man's muffled whoop of triumph, and couldn't contain a smile. He knew that feeling, not dredged from the recesses of his memory, but because he could feel it too, like a celestial high granted to him by ... the universe? ... God? He didn't know.

In the front seat Adam's face hurt, his chest ached, and his entire body trembled, but it was a good ache, from absolute and complete joy, better than any drug or lover. If he could just stay in this moment forever, live out in eternity like this, suspended in this moment like a drop of water frozen on a pane of glass.

"Unknown aircraft, this is LEO Orbiter 9 requesting immediate verification, Acknowledge."

The moment tarnished as he opened the radio channel. "Roger Orbiter 9, this is Delta 1 trans-atmospheric novice flight from Fort Harmony requesting lunar route on grid Bravo One One, over." He had an immense amount of trouble keeping the grin out of his voice, glancing back at Earth's beautiful, marbled surface

There was a moment of static before, "Delta 1 cleared, lunar route on grid bravo one one. Alter course right 90 degrees lateral and 50 degrees vertical from your position, and continue course on the blue marker."

He acknowledged the call and fired the engine positioning the aircraft in a horizontal plane with the Earth as the sun dipped back behind Earth's horizon, darkening the space around him before filling his vision with a thousand yellow glimmering lights, like stars or fireflies. It was with another incomprehensible rush of glee that he realized, those weren't stars, those were cities. Somewhere, someone down there was looking up at the sky, and unknowingly gazing at him.

The marker on his instruments blinked, and he again adjusted the engines to bring the aircraft around in a slow curve away from Earth and further into the blackness of space. The moon glowed like a distant celestial jelly-fish within the darkness.

"Delta 1 be advised, coarse adjustment two degrees vertical from your current for debris removal on course 2.1 degrees left and vertical of your position. Trans-space conditions have debris field warnings at a level 5, please proceed with caution."

"Roger, Orbiter 9 course corrections for acknowledge debris removal advisory."

He slowly adjusted, bringing the jet into a slow acceleration, avoiding the G-forces that would come with any abrupt acceleration. He would cut the engines when at speed to conserve energy. In the vastness of space, it seemed as if they were snailing across the expanse.

He keyed the mike on his suit, "Status, Captain Palmer?"

"Just fine cadet," the response breaking over his com.

Space outside was quiet, not that it could be anything else.

"May I ask a question?" He could hear his own voice over the speakers, and thought the experience to be rather unpleasant. Was his voice really that high?

"Shoot."

"Debris removal? I didn't think they did that out this far."

Their speed was slowly increasing. Earth was falling away behind them at an increased rate and power that their ancestors could only have imagined, and had only imagined in their movies and science fiction books.

"Over two thousands years of space travel, millions of satellites, rocket pieces, debris from accidents, establishing a base on the moon, and the colonization of Mars. There has been a ton going on up here for quite a while. A lot of people think since space is so vast, it's not a big deal to leave things floating up here. Problem is, trying to tap and track it all so we don't accidentally run into it. With exponential addition of debris comes exponential likelihood of collisions."

"I see. How bad is a level 5 advisory? I mean, I know theoretically, but..."

"Level five is pretty serious, expect to see heavy clusters, and expect multiple course corrections. Point is, keep an eye on the short range radar, no.... just keep an eye on everything."

"How far are they into the cleanup?"

Captain Palmer snorted, which came as a burst of static over the line. "Not even close. The UN only advised the cleanup fifty maybe sixty years ago, and they've been struggling with funding. A lot of the barges haven't been serviced since they were put into service, and most are barely maintained to proper specifications."

"Are there any other dangers I should expect?" At speed, he had cut the engine and allowed them to coast through space on his pre-planned trajectory.

"This is space kid, nothing more dangerous, but if you want a short list, space debris, solar flares, coms outages etc."

Vir spent the next hour squeezing the more experienced man for information between periods of course correction. He wasn't kidding about the debris problem. This place was an equipment graveyard and all around him hung the bones of unnecessary or outdated technology.

He kept an eye on his instruments as the captain had suggested, not that he would have ignored them otherwise. In between occasions of instrument examination, he couldn't help but slipping into his initial ecstasy. This felt like a dream.

He was in space. The only place he had always wanted to go, and the one place that always seemed so far away, physically and metaphorically. A light blinked on his dash, and he looked down to find the small green light blinking on his radar indicator.

Following the prompting from his equipment, Cadet Vir switched comms frequency and sent out a hale, "Acknowledge, unknown aircraft, be advised this is Delta 1 closing in on your airspace."

He waited, and waited, and waited.

"Acknowledge, unknown aircraft"

Still no answer as the craft was growing closer. From the trajectory maps, he noted a slight deviation of the aircraft from its planned course, not to mention the densely back debris field which took up a surprisingly large chuck of space directly in front across their trajectory.

He opened the com prepared to repeat his hail when.

"Delta 1 this is Skywake, go"

He took a deep breath in relief. He could see the barge now. It was an old model, a dragger by nickname, using a programmed magnetic field on a drag chain to collect junk and send it in the proper direction, but at this current moment it simply idled in space with it's drag chain suspended useless behind and slightly to its left.

"Skywake this is Delta 1, advising course correction 1 degree horizontal right, or advise ATC course correction."

"Negative, Delta 1, course correction impossible experiencing technical difficulties. ATC has been notified."

Reaching the edge of the debris field, Vir used both sight and radar to plot the best course through the field firing the engines after rotating the rear thruster forward to slow his progression and then taking a wide detour to the side. As far as space went, there was a lot of room between him and the junk, but large spaces meant nothing at high speeds.

"What the hell are these guys doing?" Captain Palmer cursed from the back. He had a heavy desire to order the kid on a larger course correction, but the boy had done well enough so far. Captain Palmer sat uneasily watching the events unfold.

Whatever technical difficulties the barge was having had now caused it to drift heavily to its left leaving the craft positioned dangerously close to the nearest cluster of junk. Adam had studied flying for six years now, non-stop from morning until night, and he knew proper procedure on piloting a drag barge even though he had never performed a flight.

He knew what too close looked like.

Adam opened the com again intending to warn the pilots of their course drift in case their interior emergency had distracted them from their piloting duties.

It was then he noticed a light blinking in the darkness. The light at the end of the magnetic drag chain popped on for a moment. As it did, a chunk of wreckage popped off the outer skeleton of the nearest wreck like the sluffing of skin. It twirled idly through space gaining momentum towards the drag chain where it was likely to stop and stick, but as it grew closer, the light at the end of the chain shut off, and the bit of wreckage bypassed the chain entirely hurtling past.

"Shit!" Adam scrambled for the coms, "Skywake Coll-"

He wasn't able to finish his sentence as the piece of junk had gone tearing past the drag chain, severing a side bumper before plowing into the back of the ship near the engine bank. How it hit had been the worst scenario possible. Something ruptured, blasting through the outer hull, finding fuel by way of the oxygen within. The explosion was silent but violent as fire consumed all the available oxygen in the interior, melting metal and rocketing shrapnel into the surrounding space. Even as the fire died, fuel consumed in an instant, shrapnel continued to hurtle through space, not slowing down and not stopping. The explosion itself had been enough to blast the closest wreckage sideways, which was now being pelted with discharged shrapnel from the charred remains of the barge.

For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

As space junk crashed into space junk, a chain reaction was initiated, and the field about them quickly turned into the grinding blades of a blender as shrapnel flew at explosion speeds, nearly 3,000 mph, in all directions transferring its energy into anything it touched. They could have easily outrun the explosion, if it weren't for the minefield of debris ahead of them.

Captain Palmer stared in horror, idle hands reaching for controls that weren't available, and was shocked out of dread when the small sub wing engines fired to their back and sides. The rear engine engaged, and the jet cut a tight spiral downwards and then up, sheering past a gargantuan sheet of metal which had blasted from the original wreckage. They were so close to imminent death that it cast a shadow over them as they rolled upright.

In the pilot's seat, Adam had gone very still. Outside hellfire rained down upon them, yet Vir was a rock against the impending onslaught. He thought about nothing, he felt nothing but he saw everything. The skeleton of some long decommissioned shuttle sliced past them as he rolled in a counterclockwise circle spinning over and around the speeding shrapnel.

There was a moment, a lone slice of time when Captain Palmer found himself looking up, technically down, at the object, watching as light from the distant sun cut razor edges along its sheer metal ribs. He could have reached out and touched it. His body was launched right as the jet continued its tight roll, immediately diving downwards as a metal beam careened past and into the darkness. Suddenly his body was thrown back against his seat, limbs screaming in protest as they rolled into an immediate vertical climb. He groaned against the force, feeling the apparatus around his legs constrict.

Adam felt nothing. His hearing was completely gone, space around him had slowed. He yawed left, barely avoiding losing one of his wings to an unrecognizable ball of melted metal.

Rolling over the top of the second skeleton, Adam plunged down on the other side, forcing his body to take as many Gs as it could handle. He cut left and then right, rocking upwards and then sinking down below the next obstacle like he was riding the trough of a wave. A short acceleration and tight turn to the right pulled them away from another collision and a short vertical dive then rolling upwards between two jagged teeth of metal brought them slicing into the first open space they had seen since the disaster began.

For a moment they thought they were safe, but a sudden jolt sideways, throwing the right wing up and the left wing down towards vertical brought them perpendicular to one piece of trash Adam had not expected to see. Time jolted to a stop for him as he lifted his head and looked through the top of the canopy ... coming face to face with a partially charred corpse, every excruciating detail of scarlet and white blistered skin seared into his brain. Light from the white hot sun behind them cast the charred skin into sharp relief highlighting its raw edges in razor intense light and casting the rest into deep black shadow. White bone glittered from a hole torn in the throat, and a single eyeless socket peered at him from the blackness.

Then it was gone.

He pulled the jet vertical just in time to roll right.

At one point, he flipped the engine, forcing them to slow so fast that Captain Palmer nearly blacked out despite all their extra assistance. He feared the worst when his vision cleared, but somehow Adam had managed to roll the jet in a tight backwards loop and under the refuse to their front.

Ahead of them, the moon glowed white in the sharp, unforgiving light of the sun.

"Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! Lunar 1; this is Delta 1 F-90 Darkfire, in immediate danger of debris collision requesting ground to air support, position 75 degrees vertical right 20 degrees heading course correction to grid bravo one one with two persons on board, do you copy!"

"Delta 1, this is Lunar 1 authorizing immediate ground to air assistance."

Another roll to the right, as a chunk of metal ripped past.

They could see the lunar station now, a strange atmospheric bubble kept in place by a grid of gravity generators and life support systems as wide as a sizable city, on the bright side of the moon. Somewhere just outside the atmospheric field, an AA (anti air) gun locked onto a target and triggered release. The piece of debris was vaporized instantly.

After that came a volley of similar explosions reducing the space debris to ash, creating ethereal powder clouds. The AA guns were not effective at distances much outside their current position.

Adam adjusted position catching the moon's orbit. They were close enough now that he could see the craters and pockmarks on her surface. The closer they got, the more detailed the surface became until they were in a LLO (low lunar orbit) not much further than 70 miles from ship to surface. Distantly the flashes of the rail guns were bursting forth in the darkness, but they were out of the field of danger.

"Lunar 1, this is Delta 1, requesting permission to land runway 2 left."

They waited for a moment cutting over the lunar horizon slowly angling downwards into landing position.

"Delta 1 you are cleared to land runway 2 left, proceed at current heading and reduce speed."

He did as told, descending closer and closer and closer to the lunar surface. The moment they connected with the atmospheric bubble was more violent than anticipated. Sudden friction due to air pressure slowed them with a jolt and the sudden entrance into the gravity field dragged them downwards, but he forced the jet into submission, and guided her gently towards the ground, reducing speed throughout. All around his instruments were malfunctioning in confusion based on the man-made magnetic field which companioned the analogue atmosphere.

Their landing left... something to be desired. It could have been prettier but being jarred a couple of times was better than being dead. Sound had returned with the presence of air and the roaring of the wind against the flaps was deafening as they came to a slow stop.

"Delta 1, you are clear to taxi."

The jet didn't have to idle far before they were given the command to stop. Their wheels were immobilized, and ladders were brought to each side of the canopy which released with a loud hiss. Captain Palmer clutched with stiff fingers to the release on his helmet, ripping it from his head and pulling the oxygen from his face with a desperate gasp, thankful for the millionth time that some nerd had managed to rig up an atmosphere.

His body was stiff, his legs and back hurt, but getting out of that cockpit was the best feeling in the world. With his stiff limbs, he maneuvered himself onto the ladder and turned expecting to see the cadet already gone, but the boy was still sitting in position inside the cockpit. This close he could see the young man's chest heaving desperately for air. Hands, once steady on the controls began to shake, tiny oscillations at first, then morphing before his eyes into bone rattling tremors that probably would have registered on the Richter Scale. With stiff hands the boy scrambled at his helmet, but the fingers refused to cooperate, growing more desperate every moment.

Captain Palmer grabbed him by the shoulder to steady the horrendous shaking and released the helmet, pushing it into the arms of one of the waiting technicians. The boy managed to rip the oxygen mask from his face with clumsy fingers and gasped at the air like a dying fish, quick and shallow.

Captain Palmer gripped the back of the boy's jacket and forced the boy to look at him. "Hey, hey! Look at me! Look - at - me!" The wide green eyes were wild with panic glittering with unshed moisture.

"That was some DAMN good flying, damn good, now take some deep breaths..... there you go..... relax." The boy complied although shakily. "We made it. You got both of us out alive, now come on let's go get out of these suits, maybe get something to eat."

He was ready to slide down the ladder when, "C-captain p-p-Palmer.....I c-cant feel... m-my legs."

He looked up at the boy and sighed, "Delayed response." Palmer ordered one of the technicians into place on the other side and then had another ladder brought over. Together the two men managed to help Vir from the cockpit and down the ladder where his knees gave out. Captain Palmer caught him around the middle and walked him to a sitting position on the ground. He knelt next to him as a team of paramedics rushed from the bay doors.

"He's fine, just a little post-panic is all. Can you feel your legs yet?"

The boy nodded, "I.... think so."

"Good," he patted the kid reassuringly on the back as the paramedics looked him over, "Like I said kid, that was some impressive flying, and you kept it together until we landed. See this," he held up a hand, "I'm shaking too."

The boy's breathing was evening out, "Captain Palmer, can I ask a favor?"

"Anything you want kid," and he meant it.

"Can I call my parents?"

Captain Palmer barked a laugh which filled the analogue atmosphere on Lunar 1, "Cadet, if you asked to call the president of the UN, I'd find her number and hand you the phone."

He ordered a phone be brought to the kid on their way in, thankfully Vir accepted the help of one of the paramedics who walked him through the doors and into the safe open arms of solid ground.

-

"So that's why we keep the engine room far away from the crew quarters," the captain explained. They were passing through another cramped doorway, when for the first time since Krill had met the human, the Captain stumbled, catching his foot on the edge of the door and nearly falling, forced to catch himself on the doorframe, hopping to regain his balance.

"Son of a -" he blurted, his mouth shut and sheepishly he looked back at Krill. Rubbing his absent leg as if he could feel it, "Sorry about that, it's a good replacement, but not perfect."

The doctor was fascinated, "In what way?" He had to have answers.

The human rubbed the back of his neck, Krill wasn't entirely sure what the gesture meant yet, but he had isolated it to two situations: when the human was uncomfortable, and when the human was thinking, "It can feel heat and cold and pressure just fine, but... but its like sometimes I can't tell where it's oriented in space. Especially the toes and the ankle. I mean, I can feel that it's rotated, but not how FAR it's rotated. I can't explain any better than that. I'm not a scientist, and while it's fine most of them time, it still causes issues more than a real leg."

"How did you lose it?" Krill questioned.

One of the furry lines, an eyebrow as Krill had learned, raised slightly, "A bit blunt aren't you? People usually wait a while before asking me that question and when they do it's usually in a whisper, like they're worried they'll startle me with the realization that my leg is issuing."

"I'm ... sorry?"

"Don't be, it's refreshing. I lost my leg in the Drev war."

Krill pulled up, a bit surprised. "The Drev war, I knew humans participated, but I never thought..."

"Yeah, I know," he sighed. "Anyway the Drev...well, from what I understand, their war practices are personally aggressive. Humans have spent thousands of years trying to develop technology that will kill the most people from the farthest distance. We try to sterilize war, remove ourselves from the horror. For the Drev, warfare is... it's close combat. Their methods include ripping off limbs to ... to gain an advantage." The human was looking a bit pale now, and moisture was collecting, seemingly out of nowhere, on the skin of his face. His body temperature had skyrocketed dramatically. His chest rose and fell heavily. He paused against the wall gripping one of the exposed pipes with a hand.

The doctor approached uncertainty, "Captain ... are you ... having a medical emergency?"

The man shook his head taking a deep breath, "No...I'm ok...it's just...hard to talk about."

He took a few deep breaths squeezing his eyes shut for a second. His body temperature began to lower. Krill, despite being concerned, as a medical professional was also fascinated. He wasn't entirely sure what was happening. There was no physical sign of trauma, but the body was reacting in a way to suggest that something was wrong; increased breathing, elevated heart rate, elevated body temperature.

The reaction faded as quickly as it had come. The captain straightened up, face spreading into an easy smile as if nothing had happened. He walked them the last few feet towards another set of double doors. "And lastly, I welcome you to ... the mess hall." The doors opened before him into a massive cavern or room at what must have been the center of the ship. It was here that the humans had chosen to congregate.

Krill was shocked at the sheer scale of it, high vaulting over a long room clustered with dozens of circular tables arranged in no specific order or discernible pattern. The groupings suggested, like everything else, a primary social structure by which humans lived. The more he looked, the more this became apparent. It was the odd human who sat alone, mostly they grouped themselves in clusters, sometimes seating more than was intended. Occasionally, those that did sit alone, weren't actually alone, but in close proximity with another human, not speaking but still together. Arguably, the fact that the humans were all in one room implied a social framework even if they DID choose to sit alone.

Further examination identified the consumption of – unknown substances – some looked plant based while others looked – Krill had to turn away. He had never seen a carnivore feeding, well to be precise they were omnivores but nonetheless watching a predator consume another sentient life form was gruesome and appalling. Krill's insides did a double backflip and were close to turning themselves inside out. Krill vowed he would NOT include himself in this barbarous scene. He always took his sustenance alone and would continue to do so. Why the humans would choose to fuel themselves together was a mystery.

What else did humans insist on doing together rather than apart?

The Captain, who was proving himself to be an entity of great unpredictability strode towards the nearest table, leaving Krill to shuffle after him. Upon reaching the table, the human demonstrated his great ease of balance by swiftly climbing first onto a chair and then onto the table itself, without the aid of his hands. In many other species that feat would have been difficult at best. The uncanny ability to move vertically, balance one's weight with a single foot.... and with a center of gravity up so high.... well it was unusual.

The humans that sat at that particular table looked up at their alpha in mild confusion or amusement Krill guessed, but without much surprise which suggested the Captain was known for doing similarly strange things.

"Good Morning, Captain," one of the humans ventured.

"Good morning, Jackie, glad to see you're doing well."

She tilted her head, "Are you wearing an eyepatch?"

He tilted his head from side to side as if to demonstrate to the other human his injury, which made no sense to Krill. It seemed like a bad idea to flaunt a weakness. He would have assumed that a species like the humans would take that as a loss of dominance and subsequently fight him for power.

"I am, do you like it?"

"I mean ... yeah it's pretty cool but..... what about your eye?"

"About that.....I may have ... lost it."

She didn't seem to have expected that, but before her surprise could fully register, the human looked away from her and cupping his hands around his mouth issued a powerful, bellowing call bringing his entire pack of humans to attention, "HEY MISCREANTS, YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE!"

They obeyed almost instantly, the murmuring dying to a few quiet whispers on the fringes of the crowd, "I have a few announcements upon the event of my glorious return!"

There were a few snickers from the crowd. Clearly, they thought something was funny though Krill couldn't fathom what.

"First of all, I am glad to report that I survived."

More chuckling.

Krill thought that was sort of obvious, he wouldn't be standing here if he hadn't.

"Secondly, yes this is an eyepatch and yes that does mean I lost an eye. But fear not, I lost an eye but received like 100 awesome points because nothing is more badass than an eyepatch which, fun fact, is totally the only reason that pirates wore them, absolutely no other reason - none whatsoever."

The humans seemed to be greatly enjoying this, but what parts of the conversation Krill DID understand seemed outrageously ludicrous and nonsensical.

"Our third order of business, I procured a distinguished and brilliant medical officer."

That stirred some conversation in the crowd, and they all craned their necks to see the new physical. Captain Vir turned and motioned Krill forward, "Well come on Doctor, don't be shy."

Krill approached the table, but stopped there glaring, if his species could glare, up at the man who had his hand held out.

"Don't give me that look doctor, I know you can float, come on, get up here."

Krill felt a deep sense of annoyance rising up inside him, but he did as told, floating high enough to be hauled onto the table with the Captain. The room erupted in an explosion of noise as the humans saw him. He had no idea if the sounds they were making were hostile or not, but he was trusting in the alpha status to keep him out of harm. He desperately wanted to float away to safer surroundings, but he was held in place by the Captain. Humans were standing in their seats now, craning their heads over each other to get a good look at him. So many forward-facing eyes.

"Alright, ALRIGHT! Sit your asses down, and QUIET so I don't have to raise my voice ... good. Everyone, this is Dr. Krill, and by his own accounts he is the galaxy's preeminent trauma surgeon, and a passable doctor for humans. I am inclined to believe him seeing as I am not a drooling idiot."

"That second statement is debatable," someone offered from the crowd.

Krill flinched, not entirely sure what the human was going to do with the challenge to his dominance. Was he going to witness a human fight? Were they going to tear each other apart for the role of alpha? The captain laughed. Krill had learned about this particular use of the lung, diaphragm and vocal cords just a few hours earlier. Humans "laughed" when something was humorous – causing amusement.

"Ok, ok, point is I have all the faculties that I was ORIGINALLY gifted with however limited those may have been."

What- was- happening? The alpha human was self-deprecating in front of a larger group of humans ... and receiving a favorable response. None of this made sense. Everything about the man implied some modicum of weakness. He was young, he was injured, and if what he just said was true, he admitted to not being the most intelligent in the group, so what made him alpha and what made these other humans so willing to follow him?

There was also the curious fact that Krill found the captain, well he found him kind of annoying if he was being totally honest. Despite being one of the most fascinating creatures the doctor had ever met, missing both an eye and a leg, he was overly talkative, unrealistically optimistic, frustratingly subjective, and completely unpredictable and that was just the stuff Krill had noticed in the brief time he had known him. Problem was, he was also the only human that Krill currently trusted. Somehow his annoyingness in aggregate also made him far less intimidating.

"And because of our new and most prestigious crewmember, I thought this would be a great time to go over a quick safety briefing. I could have done this one on one, but I thought some of you yahoos might need a reminder now and again."

Krill's translator caught one whispered reply to the Captain's announcement, "Most of those rules are BECAUSE of the captain."

"Hey, I resemble that remark," Vir turned that intense green eye upon the crewmember, "You see me paying attention don't you, ready to be riveted by my own glorious list of safety protocols."

Vir turned away again and back to the crew, "Ok kids let's hear it, rule number one."

There was a general muttering about the room.

"Oh come on, I can't hear you!"

"AYE AYE, CAPTAIN!"

This time, the laughter went beyond mere snickering. Someone behind the doctor made a choked snorting noise.

"Ok, that was - that was actually pretty funny."

Krill didn't see how that gibberish could be funny, though he didn't entirely understand what funny was. Eventually the crew calmed down long enough to respond to the original question, "No chucking marshmallows at neutron stars."

The captain rubbed his hands together, "Ah there it is, and why children, do we not chuck marshmallows at neutron stars?"

"Dropped from a distance of 1 AU a single marshmallow can cause an explosion equal to that of three-megaton nuclear warhead," they droned in unison. The way they seamlessly slid from single minded reaction to hive minded repetition was actually sort of creepy and made Krill's innards vibrate in a rather unsettling way. It didn't help that he had no idea what a marshmallow was. It must be something dangerous, so Krill was determined to find out what they were and how to avoid them.

The captain held up a hand to quiet the talking, "Good work, but let's set aside the joking." And it was here Krill was surprised to watch as the human seemed to completely change the structure of his face, body and voice. Where once an open smile lingered, it was quickly replaced by pulling the lips into a tight line oriented downwards. The eyebrows were pulled somewhat inwards on the face, making his eyes smaller. The effect served to age him. Where his hands had been open and loose before, they had taken position behind his back clasped lightly, his feet were planted shoulder width apart. His head was slightly tilted down.

When he spoke his voice was deeper, harder and quite commanding, " Number one, as per the UNSC safety regulations manual; food and drink are unconditionally prohibited near the warp core. Second, and I CANNOT stress this enough; sexual harassment, assault, discrimination or anything like unto it will NOT be tolerated. Anyone male or female who initiates, participates or condones in any way, shape or form any such behavior will be immediately terminated from duty and, by UNSC bylaw, will be dishonorably discharged and sentenced according to the severity of the punishable offense. Third, open flames are prohibited on the bridge, near the warp core, or the reactor core. I'm dead serious about this one guys. I don't feel like dying because you thought it might be a good idea to roast a marshmallow near the warp core. Please see the UNSC safety manual for any and all other issues or concerns you may have." As soon as he stopped, the human morphed into his 'normal" self: his posture dropped, his face relaxed, and his intonation lightened. The change was ... quite remarkable.

"As far as my personal ship rules, buckle up because it is a much longer list. Driver chooses the music and since I'm the Captain, I pick the music. Although, I do accept bribes for requests. Don't eat food that isn't yours. The UNSC manual states that romantic relationships between crewmembers is prohibited, but I'm going to say right now that if I don't find out then it didn't happen. Don't get pregnant, don't get anyone pregnant, this counts doubly for shore leave. If you are arrested, fined or kidnapped, all bail, parking tickets, ransoms or debts will be paid out of your monthly wages." There was a general muttering about the crew, and Krill noted some strange expressions being bandied about.

The Captain plowed on, "Playing golf, frisbee, badminton, football, baseball, hockey or any other game or sport out of the airlock is prohibited. The space suits are not for your entertainment. And this rule is only here for your safety.... and mine.... mostly mine," he waved a hand and continued, "do NOT play with the artificial gravity modulating systems. I know you want to see how high you can jump at half your weight, or float around trying to drink water droplets, but this causes problems for the rest of the crew, and please for the love of Jupiter, don't ask me for an exception because I will probably agree and we will all definitely regret it. All wheeled systems of transport are prohibited in the cargo bay during flight. All drinks on the bridge must be in closed containers. Excessively loud mouth noises are prohibited. Wash your hands. Don't put foreign substances of unknown origin in your mouth, and certainly don't put them on your hands. Showers are and will be mandatory, no exceptions. I reserve the right to terminate your employment on my ship if your smell offends my sensibilities."

He had to pause for air here, "Some of these, extra rules, may not be mentioned in the UNSC manual, but the UNSC cannot protect you from the opinion and retribution of the common man." Vir turned to look at the doctor, "Did you get all that?"

Krill stared blankly up at him, "There were entire sentences I could not understand and what exactly is a marshmallow?"

The captain looked him over with a critical eye, "That's alright, you don't strike me as a delinquent and it would be my pleasure to introduce you to the marshmallow." With that he turned back to his pack, "Thank you for your attention, you may return to your victuals." Then, with the ease and power that could only be demonstrated by a predatory species, he leaped from the table and landed softly upright on the floor before Krill, cushioning his impact by bending his knees ever so slightly. Krill stared at him.

He determined, at that moment, that any sort of creature that could pull a stunt like that missing one leg and one eye was probably more worth being friends with than enemies.


	18. Chapter 18

The human digestive tract was evolved with the breakdown of extremely tough substances and the elimination of bacteria in mind. For this reason human digestive juices contain hydroelectric acid (with a ph of 1-2), potassium chloride (used in lethal injection), and sodium chloride (salt). This cocktail of gastric acid has a ph strength of 1-3 and has the capabilities to dissolve metal. Species particularly vulnerable to the defects of acid should be advised on the proper disposal of a human body, and are encouraged to stay clear of humans suffering certain illnesses that may shift the acid outside the body. 

-

The rising sun bled fire into the sky above. Molten rays of light seeped across vast, golden landscape, creeping like the slow ooze of lava over stone.

Metal whined, screaming through the air to clatter in an explosion of sparks. The tiny pinpoints of light leapt into the sky, suspended against the rising sun, only to be snuffed out by a torrent of wind. Again, metal whistled through the misty, early-morning air sending lances of light up the leaf-like blade and narrow shaft. More sparks erupted in a wide fan-pattern across the ground as one leaf tipped blade cut a long line down the shaft of the opposing spear.

The two combatants disengaged.

Liquid gold spilled rapidly from the upper hillside down onto the dueling circle, washing the combatants' feet and armor with a light sheen of atmospheric glory. Together their spiked armor gleamed like spires of silver ice cast into the light of the sun. Metal flashed and sparkled like ice-capped mountains. Under their armor, the two combatants glimmered with a churning color all their own, one, an embodiment of a misty morning in glittering silver blue, and the other standing regally like a golden statue endowed with the wealth of kings.

In the early morning light, the darker combatant lunged forward, whipping her spear about in a tight arc. Metal clashed against metal, sending a crack of energy across the open rock, echoing into the lightening sky. The golden warrior whipped the opposite end of his spear around, using the momentum of his entire weapon to drag the other combatant forward with their locked blades.

She ducked under the cutting swing, disengaging before whipping her spear back towards his exposed side. He caught it with a downstroke and she rolled the shaft over, catching sparks off his helmet as the blade grazed past his armored cheek. He took the hit, using the opportunity to rotate his body to the side, sweeping his spear tip across her breastplate and nearly wrenching the weapon from her hands.

With the power of his momentum the golden warrior's cape billowed upwards on a current of air, catching momentarily behind his head a fierce silhouette lit by the sun. The second warrior let go with one of her hands, allowing herself to fall backwards and extract the spear from its locked position. She caught herself, crouching low while sweeping at the golden warrior's feet.

Light cascaded off her spearhead once more as it cut through the air spilling golden droplets onto the watching crowd as they roared with frenzied encouragement. In the sky above, blood red was mixing with a delicate grey blue mottling the two seperate colors towards a somewhat dulled violet.

The golden warrior cut down, blocking the strike aimed at his feet, the crowd riveted with anticipation and excitement. With a scooping motion like he was wielding a shovel, the golden warrior flicked the tip of his spear upwards, wrenching the weapon from his opponent's hands and sending it skyward. Suspended for a moment, framed against the slowly bluing sky, shedding light and spinning like the needle of a compass caught in a magnet, the spear slowly arched down as a hand reached out and snatched it from the air.

He dropped into a low crouch, one foot forward, the other bent low, balancing most of his body weight upon the balls of his feet. The two spears were held on either side of his body pointing forward at the disarmed opponent. A sharp gust of wind kicked up, ripping his cape back and up like amber ribbons of conquest.

For the longest moment, the combatants held quite still, breathing hard and bathed in the warmth of the morning sun, which had finally ripped itself from the horizon and clawed its way into the sky. Reds, golds and pale violets had faded to white and blue, deepening the shadows crawling across the arenas.

The silence lasted only a few seconds before the air erupted around them. The Drev trumpeted their battle cries and slammed their spears against the ground. The effect was like the crash of rolling thunder or waves breaking over stone. The sound roared across the valley. The very stones themselves rattled like the heralding of an eruption.

Inside the circle, the smoky Drev warrior ripped off her helmet, throwing her head back to gasp for air. Her bright green eyes glittered in the early rays of the sun as her chest heaved. She knelt on the stone, head towards the sky as the golden warrior straightened himself to his full height: nine and a quarter and slid back the top portion of his visor.

General Lumnus adjusted the two spears and breathed deeply as he stepped across the stone holding out the younger Drev warrior's spear, "You fought well, soldier."

She bowed her head, and accepted the proffered weapon, "I...could have fought better."

"It does not do to dwell on what could have been, but to look forward to what may be improved." All around them the gathered crowd broke chattering to each other in the low guttural language of the Drev.

She bowed her head once again and rose slowly to her feet. Off to the side of the circle, a small group of Drev remained standing stoically under the light of the morning sun: one would be the young soldier's weapons mentor, and other her commanding officer, both coveting the general's status and prowess.

It was no secret that many Drev lusted after General Lumnus's position. He had held his rank and position for many years, since before his son was born. But, even after all those years of dedicated service to the clan, there was talk. General Lumnus had not set foot on a battlefield, for what seemed like many years. There was gossip that he had lost his hunger for battle, lost his stomach for the fight, worst of all, he left his mate, General Cosma, to fight alone on the field of battle without his support

Not that she needed it.

The accusations, while founded in a measure of truth, could not be strictly proven. General Lumnus had taken it upon himself to direct the defenses of the clan city and the cathedral within. He had done such an exceptional job that no one could question his loyalty to the city as the occasional attack had been easily rebuffed by his preparations and instructions. Still those accusations existed, making many of the younger Drev eager to compete for his position.

So, despite countless challengers, not one warrior had managed to prove to be his better or even his equal. He had accepted all opponents without complaint and bested them with pronounced ease, no less skilled than before. His latest opponent stepped from the circle, greeted by her teacher and her commanding officer who immediately began giving her pointers on what she could have done better, but that was the way of the Drev. They strove for glory in combat, and no one was perfect, one could always be better.

General Lumnus angled the spear over one plated shoulder and turned to the other three remaining Drev. The tallest: imperious, beautiful, and stiff simply nodded to him before turning and walking away, disappearing into the crowd with her tattered cape billowing behind her. He watched her go, eyes riveted upon the beautiful patterns of swirling purple, both dark and light, that paraded across her carapace, like the glittering nebulae from the heavens above.

"That was amazing, Father!"

He turned back as his offspring ran to greet him.

"Amazing!" The youngest parroted.

His son came to a stop in front of him, royal red carapace standing out like a jewel against the backdrop of the fertile valley. A few more years, he thought, and the boy would be taller than he was, and as good a warrior, if not more so.

"Amazing is a bit too strong a word, don't you think, son."

The young Drev paused then nodded stiffly, hand clasped about his simple, steel quarterstaff. "It was...cunning and strategic father."

Lumnus chuckled.

Down below, from around his knee, his youngest frowned. "I still think it was amazing." He smiled fondly at his daughter, she had her mother's looks and a glittering blue carapace that outshone both the skies above and the sapphires locked within the stone beneath. Of course, she didn't just have her mother's looks, she had also inherited her stubbornness. Trying to dissuade her from a course of action was like trying to stop the inevitable power of a lava flow.

"Will either of you be fighting today?" He inquired, leading them into the crowd and down a shallow rock gully where other members of their clan had set up for a day of reverie instead of war, maybe a little of both.

His son stopped on the side of a trail next to a flat topped stone which glittered with the silvery light of a dozen or so decorative knives; not decorative in the way that humans understand, for all Drev weaponry was built to be used, and so decorative simply meant of exceptional craftsmanship.

"I have three duels today, father. The first begins at noon."

General Lumnus nodded, then glanced at his youngest who was looming hungrily over an assortment of Coiltree berries. The baskets were almost as tall as she was. Despite her age she barely reached past his knee. He had harbored the secret hope that one day she would grow into her personality, but that day still remained elusive.

The general stepped up behind Sunny and bowed to the reclining Drev warrior who looked more than a little bored behind his basket of Coiltree berries. Drev did not aspire to different classes or professions in the same way that humans did, they essential held the same job. Everyone was a warrior, or they were dead. Of course, this created the obstacle of how necessary tasks or trades were done in the village. It was simple. Each Drev warrior was trained in an additional skill and carried out those duties when not at war or in training.

Lumnus was trained in negotiation, his son was being instructed in architecture, and Sunny, with his assistance, had gained an apprenticeship with a weapons mechanics and engineer, a side job she seemed to frequent more and more often these days. Deep down he had suspicions that others were using her job as an excuse to remove her from the battlefield, Though he had been unable to prove that coincidence to be a product of tampering by either her teachers, or some other entity.

The Drev warrior stood from his lounging position at a gesture from the general and packed a couple handfuls of the pale grey berries into a fibrous pouch made from a strange maroon moss. Sunny chirped happily upon receiving the offering, plunging her short beak-like snout into the packet with an audible crunch. Over their heads, the sun had turned the sky from a delicate pink to a pure blue. Beneath the sky, the colorful landscape appeared as a canvas of rainbow colors; warm mosses and chilled stone with the Drev themselves adorning it's rocky outcroppings like jewels atop a king's crown

Lumnus rested a hand atop her small head, "And you Sunny?"

She took a moment to swallow her treat before looking up at him. Her bright gold eyes were wistfully reminiscent of her mother, "Not yet, but I will." Inside he felt his body twinge with a terrible guilt, but he refused to let them see.

Feet skittered over stone as a group of Drevlings, offspring not yet adolescent, scampered past. One of them, running at the front of the pack, was holding a large stick on which was impaled a strange squid-like plant with many tubules and minute wriggling cilia. He licked it sporadically like a popsicle.

Sunny tugged at her father's hand and motioned after the Drevlings ducking and dodging between the feet of the older Drev, dwarfed by their greater height. A moment of hesitation passed before he ushered her into the crowd after her peers. A couple of the pale Coiltree berries fell from her packet and onto the stone only to be trod under the feet of passersby. It didn't take more than a moment before she had vanished into the crowd, obscured by the assorted feet and limbs of the clan.

As short as Sunny was, she found herself lagging behind the other Drevlings. The feet, and armored legs that surrounded her obscured her view so she scrambled and struggled to pull herself to higher ground in an attempt to determine where the others had gone. Overhead the sky was ashless. The Bright Season was upon them and the natural world about their village was alive with a thousand different hues and colors. With the great abundance of light from the sky above, the native mosses of the land were in full bloom, some even unfurling a smattering of little white flowers like stars reflected on a sea of color.

The curving branches of the Coiltrees were also adorned with delicate white petals, sheltering clusters of the unripened Coiltree berries. Their black-striped trunks were somewhat difficult to see now that they were covered with the blossoming foliage.

A cloud of delicate white spores, only visible in direct beams of sunlight, floated on the outskirts of the village were the Drev were amassed for the celebration. Aside from the distant rumbling of Drev voices, the air was silent as the seasonal rumblings of distant volcanic activity had waned.

Sunny lifted her small head to the sun feeling the warmth penetrate her carapace. A delicate breeze brushed past her skin bringing with it the sound of battle. Her golden eyes flashed open, staring down over the gully. The celebration brought not only competition but commerce. A hungry Drev could find an array of provisions and delicacies at the center of the gully's strip, yet the greatest congregation of Drev soldiers crowded the weapon vendors. Sharp guttural voices filled the air as they haggled over prices, and the occasional challenge to a duel. Dueling for the right to property was a practice generally prohibited in daily life. Most Drev would honestly rather fight for the right to property than they would paying for it fairly, so the rule HAD to be made to curb the sheer amount of frivolous conflicts that would have followed.

At the outer edges of the gully, large circles had been prepared to provide a realistic setting for combat. The circles were constructed to precise specifications, overseen by those with authority to judge the duels, mainly any military leader who retained the rank higher than squad leader. The smallest circles had only a ten length radius, while the other circles could easily reach sixty lengths in diameter. There were a few reasons for this. The larger circles incorporated as much of the natural terrain as possible, leaving the moss and the loose rock for realistic combat, while the smaller circles were intended for contests of skill, speed and accuracy.

Head panning slowly, Sunny's eyes searched the landscape, finally spotting other Drevling in her fighting class . They were congregated in the one place she expected them to be, so quickly she scrambled down a swath of teal moss and back into the gully, hurrying up behind her group, hopping and jumping, craning her neck over the taller figures and into the dueling circle where two of her classmates rotated around each other as if tethered together by a long, stiff pole.

Their instructor, a pale-eyed, shorter than average female Drev, only around eight feet tall, with a hazy violet carapace, stood at the edge of the circle as the reconciler for the fight. Standing on the other side of the circle, behind her classmates, a few adult Drev had stopped to watch the match, likely relatives of those in the circle. Unable to see from the back of the group, Sunny forced herself through the crowd, wriggling and squirming, using her size to her advantage, squeezing into places were other Drev would be unable to manuver. The other Drevlings cursed and hissed in anger as she stepped on their feet and elbowed her way into the spaces in-between, but she finally made it to the front of the group, her wide, golden eyes riveted on the fight.

The distant sound of drums echoed in the air as the last vestiges of early morning fog was burnt off by the sun. A strong breeze kicked up from the east, rippling capes and causing the Coiltrees to vibrate and rattle. Within the circle, two Drevlings lunged towards each other, splashing careening prisms of light around the circle. The taller Drevling, handsome green in color, caught his smaller opponent, a dull rusty orange, by the neck and drove him to the ground with a violent crack! Sunny felt her insides thrill a little as she watched the combat.

The fight ended quickly with Moss lifting his head to the sky and bellowing the war cry he had been practicing for weeks. Sunny wished she could do the same, but as small as she was, she couldn't maintain the lower pitch required for a proper battle cry. It didn't matter though, one day she would be able to both fight and bellow the war cry. Moss, the victor, was the most talented fighter in their class, and it was no secret that he was a favorite within their age group. Sunny was equally jealous of and in admiration of his skills.

"Victor moves on to the next bracket, loser duels next opponent in this circle," The instructor barked The rusty orange Drevling slouched in the circle as Moss walked off, triumphant.

"NEXT!" Came the order.

Hands all around the circle shot upwards, but Sunny was the fastest. The instructor's pale eyes found Sunny's and she frowned, "Sunny, you should fight someone in your own weight class." Her armored head turned slightly to the side where younger Drevlings were dueling in the next circle over.

Sunny's heart fell, but she refused to show it. "They aren't going to do that for me on a battlefield," she responded pointedly, her chin raised definitely toward her instructor. This was not the first time she had heard this argument. Her instructor conceded and then motioned Sunny forward into the ring.

Sunny stepped over the line and into the circle, stomach bubbling with nervous energy. She had been preparing for and anticipating this fight for days, she excelled at the techniques she had practiced thousands of times, and she knew she could win. No one had worked as hard as she had.

Around the circle, the other Drevlings knelt expectantly. She tried to ignore the looks of boredom or worse, secondhand embarrassment.

She would show them.

The rusty orange Drevling, Dawn, squared up against her. His fighting stance was decidedly open, all four hands held out to the side slightly bent at the elbow, feet spread to shoulder width. He didn't bother creating a more stable base for himself, and she knew she could use that to her advantage. He was going to make this easy for her.

Their instructor barked a command and Sunny launched forward like her feet were strapped to rockets. Stone vibrated under her toes sending little shockwaves up through her legs. Dawn was caught off guard by her sudden attack and took a step back in shock. Sunny was fast, and slammed into him with her full force, wrapping her arms around his middle intending to take him to the ground with her. She had imagined the strategy a thousand times and had seen it work even more.

It didn't occur to her that failure could be an option until she ground to a painful and jarring halt. While her attack had caught the taller Drevling off guard, it had NOT had the desired effect. The Drevling staggered back a few inches, but regained his footing by bracing against a lip of rock. His feet were in a better position now and Sunny's weight combined with her momentum had not been sufficient to knock him off balance. She strained against him in desperation, feeling the fight slip wildly to his advantage.

She looked up just in time to see the smirk of contempt cross Dawn's face before the world around her was upended. The ground became the sky and the sky became the ground. Her feet wheeled past the bright rays of the sun and her eyes locked momentarily on the minute cracks in the stone where the moss had been scraped from the boundaries of the circle. She had only a second to react, throwing up all four of her arms as the ground came rushing up towards her. She hit hard, a jarring bounce before rolling over the edge of the circle and into the moss. She came to a sudden stop against something solid. Her head was still spinning as she looked up, noticing then that she had been cast into shadow by a great looming figure.

The sun made it difficult to distinguish the concrete features on the face, but as she squinted those features crystalized into sharp relief. A deep purple cape billowed upon a stream of air as General Cosma looked down at Sunny. Her sharp, golden eyes, so similar to Sunny's were narrowed in a thunderous expression. Sunny tried to scramble to her feet, but caught her foot on a patch of moss falling to her knees at Cosma's feet.

The circle was absolutely silent.

"Get up!" Cosma snapped.

Sunny did as she was told, struggling to her feet and shaking off her dizziness. Cosma raised a hand and like the sudden fall of an executioner's blade she pointed to the circle. Sunny understood in no uncertain terms what was expected, and she stepped back onto the dark stone as Dawn retreated from the circle, a victor. Sunny turned to look back at the General as she towered over the cowering class of Drevlings, her caustic golden eyes boring down on Sunny like a wolf bores down on a rabbit.

"Next," she hissed softly.

No one raised their hand this time, but at the silent ushering of their instructor, one of Sunny's classmates stepped hesitantly into the circle, glancing sidelong at Cosma like he expected to be snatched up and eaten, strip of flesh by strip of flesh. The circle was muted, all the more noticeable by the noises rising up from the rest of the gully. Metal clashed against metal and distant war cries careened off the rocks, reverberating into the sky as if taunting the very sun itself.

Sunny's new opponent was smaller than average, though he was still a few inches taller than her with an eye-meltingly bright pink carapace, a rare color among the clans, supplemented more by diet than it was by genetics.

Keeping his eyes locked on Sunny, he dropped into a stable crouch, one foot forward and one foot back, two arms held wide and the other two crossed protectively over the body. Sunny's headlong rush from earlier would not be advisable here. They rotated in a slow circle. Neither of them made any noise, nor anyone outside the circle. Sunny reacted as her opponent Quartz lunged across the circle. She dodged to the side with relative ease. Although she was small, she was fast. She planned to strike at Quartz as he passed by, but he managed to pull up and swipe at Sunny with an open hand. She leaped back and to the side, what she had not intended was to be suddenly blinded by the strengthening rays of the sun. Sunny threw up a hand just in time to be plowed into the ground by a flailing elbow.

She hit her head with such force that her vision went momentarily black. The crack of her carapace against stone was like a gunshot. She couldn't have known at that moment, but the noise caught the attention of a passing group who stopped in curiosity to witness her humiliation. It was not a pleasant sight, like a carcass attracts carrion feeders so too do personal disasters attract bystanders.

Sunny's vision came back just in time to watch a sweeping purple cape disappear into the crowd. At that moment, all Sunny wanted was to curl up and sink through the stone. She could feel all eyes on her, a mixture of pity and disgust boring down on her. If she allowed herself to do what her mind wanted, then she would begin to think like them, so she dragged herself defiantly to her feet, refusing to look directly at the watchers, but also refusing to bow her head.

"Next," she muttered.

The crowd shifted.

After a painstakingly long moment, someone stepped into the circle. Sunny turned, prepared to fight although her head ached and her pride was scrambling from it's knees, refusing to be knocked down yet again. Instead of a classmate, she faced a towering figure in simple armor adorned with a royal red carapace. In one hand, her brother Cannon held a simple steel quarterstaff, his other three arms hung loosely, but comfortably at his sides. "Our father wishes to speak with you, Sunny." He glanced towards her instructor, "Will you give us a moment, please?"

All around the circle Drevlings and Drev alike relaxed, breathing deep sighs of relief as Sunny stepped from the circle, still refusing to look the bystanders in the eye. Cannon walked ahead of her, a pillar of confidence and power. She could see, from the corner of her eyes the looks of admiration and envy her classmates bestowed upon him.

Soon the circle was behind them as they cut down a dusty trail between a yellow field of moss and a red swath of Fire-bulbs, fist sized bubbles of crimson plant matter filled on the inside with sweet nectar, when ripe. The crowd vanished when Cannon pulled to a stop behind a protrusion of rock. Sunny looked about in confusion expecting to see their father waiting to speak with her, but they were alone.

Cannon turned on the spot to look at her, ramming the butt of his quarterstaff into the dirt "Pretty impressive," he stated honestly, glancing back down the mossy hillside towards the hidden circle. Sunny could still make out the sound of voices, proving that the horrific silence from earlier had been broken. Turning her head in frustration towards the daytime sky, she followed the path of a Trill as it rotated slowly past on a current of air.

"Impressed at how fast I can get beaten?" she muttered bitterly towards the glittering sky.

He leaned idly against the quarterstaff, "No Sunny, I'm talking about how WELL you can take a beating."

She turned to glower at him feeling her body grow warm with anger. She had expected this from her classmates, yes, but from her brother?

He held up two of his hands in a placating manner, leaving his quarterstaff unattended where it stuck into the dirt. "You're going to get knocked over a lot in battle, everyone does, and it's a great way to get dead. The Drev who survive are the ones who can get up."

"Not when you get knocked down every two seconds," she grumbled.

Cannon shook his head, "Doesn't matter how many times you're knocked down if you can still manage to get back up." Overhead a single cloud passed over the sun momentarily casting a large swath of the fertile belt into shadow. Another slow breeze flowed past them bringing with it the sound of clashing steel.

She glowered back at her brother in frustration. At only three feet tall, she was barely half the height of her brother, who was still growing, and likely to get taller. His large red-carapaced head looked down upon his sister fondly as she marched past him to go stand next to a Coiltree. "It isn't fair."

He tilted his head, "Of course it isn't fair, Sunny. It's war, it's not supposed to be fair."

She glanced at him over her shoulder, bright gold eyes narrowed slightly, "Mother would disagree."

He walked over to stand next to her, "Mother and I are of differing opinions on the subject, besides if war was fair then what would be the point of developing advantageous weapons, training in new techniques and tactics, as we could leave it up to the diplomats to iron out a fair resolution. Drev law calls war fair, but it really isn't. One clan is always larger than another. Someone is always more well trained, someone always has a different viewpoint and someone always has better weapons," he glanced at Sunny pointedly, "and someone is always bigger."

"But no one is usually SO MUCH smaller," she retorted grumpily before sighing and resting her head against the striped bark of the Coiltree, "I'm just not heavy enough."

Cannon shrugged, "So, make yourself heavier."

She turned to glower at her older brother, "And how am I supposed to do that? Just will the spirits to make me taller?"

Her brother moved forward, nudging her in the shoulder and toppling her onto the moss. A fountain of spores erupted from where she had fallen filling the air with a thick white pollen. Sunny sneezed and Cannon cocked his head at her in amusement, "Not with that attitude they won't. You know what your problem is, don't you?"

"I have you for a brother?"

He nudged her with his foot, as she sat dejectedly in the moss, less aggressive and more playful this time. "No, your problem is that you insist on fighting like someone who is twice your weight and at least a length taller than you. You're short Sunny, it's time to accept it! Stop working so hard to be something you aren't and may never be." She opened her mouth to cut him off, but he held up a hand to her.

"Let me finish. I'm not saying that you give up. I am saying that instead of trying to fight like something you aren't, you need to figure out how to use what you have to your advantage. A lot of Drev rely on brute force and pure strength to force a desired outcome. Skill is overshadowed by sheer power. You don't have that option, work smarter, not harder."

"How though?"

Cannon shrugged and sat down on the moss next to her, pondering at the sky, "You know how the fighting styles were created, right?"

Sunny shrugged.

"Warrior-priests took their inspiration from the spiritual elements, incorporating what they saw into their own movements." A gust of wind rolled past them and Cannon, looking thoughtful as he climbed to his feet grabbing his quarterstaff from the ground and spinning it in a wide, slow arc. As another gust of wind rolled past, he spun the spear in the other direction moving his body in fluid graceful arcs in time with his weapon. "The gale," he said sweeping his spear from side to side in long flurries, "is smooth and slow and steady, but every now and then, and without warning, it can pick up speed." He swept the steel rod of his weapon back and forth in tight spins and twirls, fluid but sharp, utilizing the entire length of the weapon. "It relies on finesse, fluidity and the occasional sudden attack." The blunt end jabbed forward, "but mostly it was designed for defense, a way to interlock defensive postures together without losing your momentum by stopping and starting a lot." Sunny lifted her head, watching the weapon with hungry eyes as it glided and flew.

"The conflagration," the movement of the spear changed suddenly, whipping and snapping back and forth in a flurry of unpredictable strikes, each end of the quarterstaff utilized to its full extent. The weapon whipped from one hand to another so fast that it was hard for Sunny to keep up, "Primarily for fast, offensive attacks, what it lacks in defense it makes up for in speed and ferocity."

"The River." His sudden sharp attacks morphed into a flurry of smooth repetitive strikes flowing from one movement to another in a relentless cascade of steel, "Fluid, relentless, and like water wears away stone, it will wear down the defense of an enemy, graceful, fluid and designed to wear at your opponent's energy until they break."

He dropped the shaft into his lower hands forcing it outwards with both hands as if to push back an opponent. He slowly advanced, bringing his spear around in jarring overhand and side hand sweeps. If one of those were to make contact with an opponent, it surely would have split their skull open on immediate impact. "The rockslide is powerful but slow. It's best defensively, but if you can utilize it in an attack then you are almost guaranteed the battle." He dropped the spear into his lowest hands and planted the butt against the ground with a sharp clatter, "You need to create a new fighting style, something that suits your height and specific capabilities."

Sunny paused, reflecting upon the words of her brother. It wasn't a bad idea, but if she was being honest with herself, she wasn't a tactical genius, fighting didn't come as naturally to her as it did to her brother, and she felt that she didn't have enough knowledge to even know how to begin developing a new style. Sunny was two things really, durable and stubborn; she learned the techniques well enough, just like the other Drevlings, but it took her lots of practice to do so. Her father and brother were completely understanding, almost embarrassingly so sometimes, like they felt pity for her. Her mother, on the other hand, got frustrated when Sunny didn't grasp things immediately, when she didn't or couldn't perform as well as Cannon had. Sunny avoided practicing in front of her mother, for obvious reasons

Cannon walked over to crouch next to Sunny, resting a hand on her arm, "You and I will work on this together."

"Shouldn't you be dueling," she muttered softly.

"Not until midday," he knelt next to her, arm around her shoulders. Even kneeling he was so much taller than she was, "You know what caught you in the last fight, don't you?"

She shook her head, too frustrated and angry to think clearly. She didn't want to talk; if she was being honest, what she really wanted was to be suddenly and magically good at fighting, to gain weight and get taller. That's what she wanted.

"You had the sun in your eyes, you were doing just fine until then."

"So," she grunted.

Cannon shook her by the shoulder, "Stop being grumpy and just listen to me for a second. The sun was in your eyes, and if it hadn't have been, you may have managed something. Do you understand what that means?"

Sunny sat there for a moment trying to think past the anger that she felt, but it burned too hotly and she couldn't focus. She threw her hands out in frustration, "I don't know, maybe if the sun was on my side then I wouldn't have lost," she snorted in derision at the thought.

"Exactly!"

She froze, "Wait, what?"

"I said that's exactly right." He pointed off towards the sun, "Get the sun in your opponents eyes, and what happened to you can happen to them." She blinked in realization. "Like I said, stop trying to fight like them, because you aren't like them. You're small, go in low and take them around the legs. It's kind of hard to keep your feet when your legs don't work and if you get your center of gravity low enough then it doesn't matter how heavy they are. Use their weight against them."

Cannon let go of her shoulder and stood, "Come on, I intend to see you win at least one fight before the end of the day." He patted the top of her head and she swatted at him with an outstretched arm.

He dodged out of the way chuckling, and together they walked back up the hill, Sunny forced to nearly run to keep up with the longer stride of her towering brother. The upper circle had since lost it's awkward silence and was now surrounded by a ring of raucous chanting as the young fighters struggled against each other.

Moss, once again, claimed the victor and his opponent, a tall yellow Drevling, hissed and kicked at the stone in frustration. Sunny looked towards the sun, judging its position in the sky. There were no clouds and now would be as good a time as any.

"Next," their instructor demanded and trailed by a string of curses, Sunny shoved her way back into the circle. She felt the atmosphere dampen as she stepped onto the rock and a large swath of onlookers stepped away grimacing. If they thought it would be difficult to watch her fail, she dared them to spend a day in her head.

Their trainer sighed, but didn't argue with Sunny allowing her to step into the circle across from the yellow Drevling, Ray. Drev do have the ability to roll their eyes, but the effect is somewhat dampened by their comparable lack of sclera to humans.

"Ready...begin!"

Sunny began circling immediately watching the lines of shadow on the ground below her, rotating like the hands of a clock. Her opponents shadow fell into position just as the onlookers began growing impatient. In her mind everything seemed to slow, tiny white spores hung on the air suspended in time. The Drev encircling the ring slowed until it seemed as if they were all moving through water. All noise suppressed and in that second nothing existed in the world but her and her opponent.

She lunged and just like she hoped, Ray didn't move. Sunny had already proven this tactic useless before, so why should it have been different. Halfway to her opponent, Sunny sidestepped bringing the full force of the sun's rays across her opponent's eyes. Ray swiped wildly at where sunny SHOULD have been, but she had dropped even lower coming up inside Ray's reach. Arms outstretched, she grabbed her opponent about the legs, just below the knees and lifted with all her might. Her opponent's feet came off the ground, and together they tumbled to the ground, Ray hitting her back hard against the stone. Sunny let go, hands throbbing as she clambered over the stone and crawled onto Ray's chest.

She got in three good hits before catastrophe.

She was kicked in the chest and sent flying backwards.

A cloud cut across the sun, casting the fertile belt into darkness. Distantly, over the mountains, a line of storm clouds was approaching, an ominous black line over the volcanic belt. Lightning flashed, though the sound never reached them. Metal still clattered against metal and war cries still echoed off the stone.

Sunny did not win that fight, nor did she win any other that day but Cannon had proven his point nonetheless.

***

Dr . Krill was coming to realize that he had made a colossal mistake, a tremendous mistake with unlimited, potentially horrific consequences. His colleagues had been right about him, the Vrul council had been right about him, everyone but him had been right about him. Krill had never assumed himself to be a risk taker, in fact he considered himself to be methodical, logical and pragmatic, but presently he found himself trapped in a metal death machine rocketing through space surrounded on all sides by a volatile predator species who he understood literally nothing about.

The moment he started to THINK he understood something was the moment that understanding was dashed to pieces against the reality of these horrific creatures. Humans were...complicated more so than they had any right to be. They were a horrific amalgamation of sentient lifeform and complete rabid animal, they were strong and powerful and dangerous and predatory and protective and territorial, but only in certain circumstances, the rules to which were lost on Krill.

This knowledge or lack thereof had him careening headfirst into his second problem: the only human Krill was willing to trust was also the human with the single most polar personality to his own. He was, in more than a word, the most annoying creature Krill had had the displeasure of interacting with.

He also happened to be the ship's captain.

The human Captain Adam Vir was everything Krill wasn't in the worst way possible. Most, if not all, Vrul are raging introverts. They only interact because having a society is the most logical way to keep one's species in tact, but otherwise they do their jobs and keep social interaction to a minimum. Humans are polar opposites, they crave social interaction even if it wasn't necessary and even advisable. They ate together, worked together, and walked in packs. When the Vrul were generally quiet due to their solitary lifestyles, the humans were not. Krill's new captain had the unfortunate habit of talking too much. Mixing his excessive chattering with his powerful, deep human voice, he was a nightmare to Krill. Everywhere they went and everyone they interacted with was dragged into a conversation or some sort of greeting. Occasionally the human managed to stay quiet when passing a particular human though he raised his head or tilted his chin in greeting. Krill would have much preferred that to the endless dialog.

The Vrul did not possess high energy levels, but this human must have been running on fusion power for he had no limit to his energy. He always walked quickly and almost bounced when he stepped, often leaving Krill behind only to return and apologize as he retrieved him. To be with him was exhausting physically and mentally. Krill had never felt such a lack of energy in his body or his mind, he believed this is what the humans referred to as exhaustion.

Krill's list of grievances was expanding and included but were not limited to the human's complete lack of objectivity, his proclivity for using nonsensical or imprecise speech, his unpredictability, and his unavoidable animal nature.

Krill wondered absently if this had to do with their predatory nature. He would probably have blamed the human's extreme energy on his status as a consumer, and not only that, but a consumer of other lifeforms. Every time Krill looked at the human's gaping mouth and sharp protruding teeth, his insides constricted. It honestly didn't help that those teeth were actually part of the skeletal structures. Yes, the humans used bones pushed through their own flesh to eat.

Of course teeth across the galaxy were quite common, but not in this way. Sentient life used teeth for masticating vegetation and herbage and not for consuming various creatures, what a horrific thought.

The captain paused in the hallway nearly causing Krill to run headlong into his legs. Krill didn't recognize this part of the ship, and couldn't have been sure how the human knew where he was going. Either the man had the entire ship memorized, or he had some sort of homing instinct, Krill would have to ask.

The human, Krill was still having trouble referring to the captain by his name as it was hard to be familiar with a predator, turned to look at Krill, his single eye oscillating ever so slightly over Krill's body. Tufts of light yellow fur stuck up in strange directions around the strap of the eyepatch, like some kind of feathered creature flightless or otherwise. With a sudden aggressive gesture, the human threw his hands out to either side exposing all his vital organs and raising his chin. Krill reeled back expecting some sort of primitive challenge, but the human just smiled. "Well Doctor, that concludes our tour of the ship, feel free to use any of the facilities open to the crew, though," he glanced over Krill's body with a jerky sweep of his eye, "I don't foresee you requiring any of them. If you need any sort of equipment just talk to the PA and she can contact one of the requisitions officers."

"Medical supplies?' Krill wondered.

The human turned to the opening behind him which lead to the bridge. Krill hadn't realized that they had come full circle. Again the human was making that strange repetitive revving noise in his chest again. The human had communicated many and various sounds such that Krill was unable to categorize and identify the many strange variations of sounds and their particular accompanying behavior. He was curious of the significance of each.

"Doctor, after you have completed a thorough assessment of our facilities, I would consult with current medical staff before you make any changes or demands. Your status went from medical god to medical student."

Krill had a sneaking suspicion that the human was mocking him somehow, though he wasn't entirely sure how to tell. The Vrul didn't mock each other, or at least when they did it, they did it very openly and in that case it moved away from mocking and towards downright insulting, but that was all just a matter of semantics.

As the human stepped onto the bridge, he was greeted with the call of, "Captain on deck!"

This was one of the confusing circumstances Krill had noticed, a little phenomena in which he did not entirely understand the rule. It seemed in most cases the humans were supposed to call the Captain by his title, but there were other situations in which Krill had seen the name used.

So far, he had not been able to discern when one was supposed to use the title, and when one was supposed to use the name.

The Captain took his seat at the head of the bridge on his elevated chair. Krill had a conclusive realization. To humans, the height at which something was placed indicated superiority, domination or importance. Krill made a mental note. The human sitting on the tallest chair is probably the one in charge.

"Can I get an ETA on that warp zone?" the human commanded

"I estimate twenty minutes to warp, sir," one of the humans answered, looking up from her console.

"Good. Doctor, why don't you stay here with us for the next twenty minutes and then head up to the med bay where you can settle in." The human had swiveled on his makeshift throne towards the front of the bridge. From where Krill stood, the man was framed by the powerful view of space expanding out before them. At the helm of a roaring heap of garbage hurtling through space at thousands of miles an hour, the human sat like a lord surveying his dominion, master of his destiny and what lay beyond. Krill had never seen a creature so comfortable considering their dangerous circumstances.

Walking off to the side to take a seat, Krill strapped himself in as seemed prudent. By chance he caught an expression on the human's face that he had yet to see. The bright green eye was... glassy? ... empty? No.... there was something in the eye, not like caught in it but it was as the creature had managed to focus past what was before him, like he was seeing something that was more than could be perceived by their limited visual organ and occipital lobe. The captain's head was tilted slightly back, the lines of his face had completely smoothed out, and the corners of his rubbery human mouth were turned up slightly. Thousands of stars winked from the glossy, slimy surface of his eye, a replication of eternity on the delicate orb. Krill could not explain it with words, but it seemed as if the reflection belonged there, like the surface was created specifically to hold eternity.

Krill shook his head, the Vrul wouldn't have bothered to wax poetic even if they were capable of it , and the thought was shaken from his mind like water is shaken from a dog.

Now that things were finally quiet, Krill could watch and observe, like he preferred. He continued his examination of the humans from a quiet and observational distance. He studied their movements, their expressions, their interactions, cataloging them for further review. Krill had always considered himself to be a quick study but these humans were proving to be more challenging than any course of study Krill had undertaken before.

"ETA?" Captain Vir had managed to snap himself from his extra-cortical activities, and was sitting straight backed in his seat. He had changed the structure of his face again upon straightening his back and this particular look made Krill shiver.

"Ten minutes out, Captain."

"Prepare the coolant systems for an alpha jump, 100% capacity."

"Charging coolant systems, sir."

"Someone better give me an operations report on the warp core," the human's single eye was locked forward on the projection arrayed before him. His body was relaxed though his gaze was fixed tensely forward. A large emission nebula had come into view on their screen as the ship arched slowly into an automated trajectory.

"Patching through to maintenance, sir."

The captain adjusted his chair and brought up a projection of their ongoing trajectory, next to that a small window appeared with the hazy face of another human, "Captain?" the woman greeted.

"Report on the warp core, can she handle an alpha jump?"

Krill shifted nervously in his seat, what was that supposed to mean? Could she handle an alpha jump? Something in there implied that it COULDN'T. The fact that there was the minute possibility that it wouldn't worried Krill very much.

The woman waved a hand, "My warp core could get you to the other side of the known universe."

The captain raised an eyebrow, "Your warp core? I was under the impression that it was MY ship and MY warp core." Krill would have assumed that the sentence was a challenge to the other human for territory, but that infuriating smile was still there confusing the signals of the situation.

The other human stuck out her lip, "Yes, MY warp core, SIR She can be yours when you come down here and take care of her like I have. She is my baby, she is my child, and I won't have you doubting her."

Captain Vir waved a hand making that strange repetitive chest noise that Krill had noted on multiple occasions, "Alright, alright YOUR warp core. Just remember that spooning the warp core is against regulation. Wouldn't want you to end up as barbecue."

"I think atomized is the word you're looking for Captain and you don't have to call me every time we warp. I'll let you know if something is wrong with my girl."

The human waved a hand at her and for the first time Krill noticed a small tarnished object in the human's left hand. "I've never skipped a preflight and I don't plan to start now." He shut off the com and turned his attention towards the slowly growing field of dust.

With one of the digits on his right hand the human engaged a button, "Good evening my hooligans, this is your captain speaking. ETA for warp is five minutes. Please proceed with the warp protocol and strap down all valuable items and persons. We also highly encourage that you strap down all un-valuable persons seeing as the UNSC frowns upon manslaughter even when accidental. All cargo areas must be secured and vacated during the time of warp. Team leaders must report and account for their crewmen. All plumbing, pumping, and purifying systems will be temporarily suspended for warp. Please exit all areas immediately surrounding the warp core, or risk being atomized, barbecued, crustified or dead-ed. On behalf of the crew of the Harbinger we thank you for flying with the UNSC." He dropped the com, spun in his seat and began issuing orders, switching from playful to commanding quickly and effortlessly.

Next to Krill one of the auxiliary crewmembers, whose job Krill could not have guessed, leaned over to him. "The Captain addresses the crew before every warp and I have yet to hear him repeat himself. People have told him he doesn't need to, but he always just says something about never skipping a preflight."

The human was smiling which made Krill die inside a bit as he realized that it was likely all humans were, to some degree, as annoying as the captain.

"Begin the Initiation sequence."

"Entering the warp zone, sir."

Deep within the bowels of the ship, Krill felt...something. It began as a slight vibration, but it moved beyond that as it penetrated into his body, into his bones, into his very mind. It seemed to warp the air and distort the very fabric of reality. Things that seemed distant appeared as if they were close, and things that were close appeared as if they were far away. He felt as if he was falling backward though he wasn't moving at all.

"Temperature readings."

"Holding steady sir, but we should go further before the heat gets worse."

Bodies appeared strangely twisted. The human grunted as if this was completely normal, "I've said it before and I'll say it again. Screw the law of thermodynamics for making my life so damned difficult."

Now Krill felt as if he were falling sideways or perhaps that the room was falling past him to the side. It seemed as if the humans were completely immune to this strange shift he was experiencing.

"Charge to 100%. Fire on my command."

As Krill sat, the room around him imploded, seeming to squeeze itself around him, distort and churn.

"FIRE."

The sudden distortion in his head suddenly receded and before them the gaseous nebula erupted with light, a light that suddenly, warped, shifted and spun. Concentric rings of light repeating the same image over and over again, becoming concave, then convex then suddenly ballooning back into a ring. Light rushed into the ring repeating hypnotically as the reflected image warped about the edges. The ship shook, metal screamed and then suddenly, there was nothing but darkness.

For a horrible second Krill thought maybe he had been blasted into oblivion aboard the flying deathtrap, but then the lights overhead flashed back on. He was sagging to the side against his seat almost completely limp. The humans around him were in less extreme, but similar states of disarray.

Captain Vir stood from his seat, "Warp report."

One of the bridge crew turned to look up at him, "Successful, sir. No indication of heat damage, autopilot is holding steady."

The man clapped his hands together, "Excellent, just what I like to hear." Stretching, he made his way over to where Krill still sagged in his sea. The Captain's stubbly, coarse hair above his eyes plummeted and his forehead scrunched in an entirely new expression. He took a knee next to Krill with all the grace and ease of someone who hadn't just been exposed to a universe altering warp.

"Hey, are you okay? You must have warped before? " His voice had taken on a rather strange cadence, slower and higher pitched.

"You ... mean to tell me...you warp without...warp dampeners?" the doctor croaked.

"A what, what?"

When Krill recovered enough to maintain his incredulity he stared at the human, "You don't know what a warp dampener is?"

The human blinked at him, "You gonna tell me doc or am I just supposed to figure this out with my powers of telepathy."

"What?"

"Oh yes, I am telepathic."

"You're lying."

"No, I'm kidding, big difference." The human was grinning, again .

"A warp dampener," Krill began with exasperation, "is a device that modulates the interior environment of a ship so that you don't risk death from disorientation when disrupting space and distance." He stood up from his seat and nearly fell over. The human caught him with laughable ease.

"Oh, well yes, we do not have one of those but hey it would hardly be fun if we did."

Krill stared at him blankly.

"Look Doctor, despite your vast superiority in space travel to us, you have to give us some credit. We've only been able to warp for the past five years." Krill nearly fell over again, sputtering and gasping.

"You, what?"

"Yeah," the human mused, eyes growing glassily distant. "I remember it like it was yesterday, nearly lost control of all my bodily functions simultaneously." He tapped his chin thoughtfully "Can't beat the view though."

Krill wondered just then if it would have been better if they had imploded.

Maybe then it would all have been over.


	19. Chapter 19

Human bone is five times stronger than steel of the same proportions and more flexible, which accounts for a human's surprising durability despite their comparative lack of internal protection to other species. 

-

Adam didn't know what he'd expected of the day humanity was to usher itself into a new era: perhaps a memorable crimson sunrise bursting with gold, maybe trumpets, maybe an iconic voice-over, hell maybe even the rapture, something to signify what was about to happen, something special, something that would mark what a truly universe-altering day this was.

This was the day that humanity would venture into the stars unbound from the chains of Earth to fulfill man's greatest wish since he had bothered to tilt back his head and stare up at the stars. This was the day the universe was to meet humanity. This day would change everything.

And he, Adam, was going to be right in the middle, right at the front line to experience it all.

However, there was no glowing sunrise, no descending choir of angels, and no movie trailer voice to announce to the world what the caged soul screaming inside his chest announced. So instead, he turned on his greatly inferior, but still pretty great "awesomeness" playlist and contented himself with a relatively mediocre sunrise. There were no clouds on the eastern horizon, so he watched quietly as the atmosphere first lit orange, to pink, then blue. Though he tried to remain calm on the outside, his insides felt as if a Xenomorph was about to burst from his chest, squealing into the rays of the rising sun.

With nervous feet, he turned from the rising sun and looked down the coastline of Cape Canaveral, well what used to be Cape Canaveral, now renamed Cape Courage after the war. It had been a historic site long before the last Pan-Asian war, even before the Third World War, a site dedicated to early space travel, filled with museums and educational centers holding the remains of early space artifacts thousands of years old. He would know, he had come here on more than one occasion as a child or as his father had said, dragged the family here quite insistently and consistently.

The coastline wasn't quite the same as it had once been, eroded and shaped over thousands of years by the hand of nature; and the hand of man, so metimes working together, but more often than not struggling against each other for dominance over the planet. Once upon a time man had almost succeeded in that struggle, preparing mother nature's grave with a smile and a wave only to clutch her tightly at the last minute, weeping like children and begging her to fix what they had broken. There had been an uneasy peace ever since.

Adam believed that mother nature would be proud of them. This was another big day for her too, her resources were no longer stretched since the colonization of Mars and if exploration, migration and settlement continued, they never would be.

He turned down the volume on his music, staring down at the launch field as he did. The notes of the song along with the thought of where he would be tonight sent a lump rising into his chest and throat so fervently that he had trouble choking it back down. On this day July 16, 1969, Apollo 11 had launched, carrying the first manned mission to the moon and setting humanity on a course that would eventually lead them to this moment.

He could see her now, the pinnacle of human achievement, sitting on the launch field, a behemoth of human engineering and a symphony of mankind's hopes and dreams. She wasn't as pretty as her namesake, or likely even a tenth as functional, but despite her cumbersome and homely looks he would have argued that she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. The UNSC Enterprise (for how could you name the first potentially interstellar ship anything else) stood proudly on the launch field before him, dwarfing everything around it, earthen and manmade structures alike.

"One small step for a man," he muttered quietly.

"LIEUTENANT!" he nearly jumped out of his skin, quickly pulling out his earpieces as he hurriedly wiped his eyes and looked up.

"I've been calling you for almost ten minutes. You parents are here. You'd better go see them before the ceremony starts."

"Right," he quickly shoved his earpieces into a uniform pocket and hurried after the other man, down the low-lying hill and towards the staging field where thousands of people were already settling in to watch. The innumerable rows of chairs had been taken up by state and government officials from all around the world, while the civilian observers crowded the outlying landscape, setting up camp chairs and blankets in the early morning sun. Looking out over the hill he was confronted by a vast sea of souls waiting and watching for what was to be the single most momentous occasion in human history, since man was cast from the garden, but perhaps he was just exaggerating.

Behind him, the sun had finally managed to rip itself from the horizon, clawing up into the sky. He past the civilians as the light from the perennial sun hit his back, filling him with warmth as he moved towards the mob of dignitaries. Past them and just off to the other side of the complex, another army of chairs had been set up for friends and family of the crew.

His family was easy to recognize in the crowd; they were tall, fair and speaking animatedly amongst each other. He broke into a trot, a smile spreading across his face. He was almost upon them before a tall, wiry man at the back of the group spotted his approach, breaking into an uncharacteristic grin.

His father, grinning widely, took him by the shoulder as he came forward. His grip was incredibly strong, his hands were calloused and his clothes were well worn, the badge of a man scarred from years of hard labor. The older man looked him in the eye for a long moment and then pulled him into a warm embrace. The faded red flannel he wore smelled like the rocky dirt around his childhood home, mixed with the faint scent of grease and his father's aftershave.

"You did it son, you did it." His father's voice was overflowing with pride and, strangely enough to Adam's surprise, a slight quiver to his usually steady voice.

The embrace broke after a moment and Adam had to clear his throat again, wiping his eyes in some measure of embarrassment. So much for him conquering space like some sort of badass, instead he was close to blubbering like a little kid. However, that thought was immediately discarded when he noticed a momentary diamond of moisture on his father's cheek, before it was swept away by the back of one heavy, calloused hand.

His mother was next, significantly shorter than him but strong, nearly crushing him in her arms. She was dressed for a special occasion and she too smelled like home, vanilla lotion and bread. She stepped back and there were tears in her expressive, blue eyes, though the tears did not shed. She adjusted his tie, and then the front of his uniform, and then his hair.

"Mom."

"Mom."

"Adam, shut up and let me mother you for a bit. If my son is going to go conquer the galaxy, then he's going to do it looking somewhat presentable."

He laughed, "Conquer the galaxy, who said I was going to conquer anything?"

"You're a Vir, I don't think it's possible for you not to," quipped David, appearing from behind their father. Fashionable and perfectly presentable, David grabbed him by the hand slapping him warmly on the shoulder. "You know I helped to develop the cooling system for that warp core," he grimaced. "Good luck."

Adam frowned, "Wait, hold on, what is that supposed to mean?"

David merely grinned and shook his head, "If you die, don't say I didn't warn you." His comment, though partially in jest, was immediately followed by a light slap to the back of his head. He ducked with a yelp and a partial laugh of surprise

"David Vir, don't you dare joke about things like that, especially since I am trying very hard not to toss my boy in the trunk and keep him there until that death trap takes off."

Adam rolled his eyes, "That's two thousand years of human engineering mom, not a deathtrap."

She raised one blond eyebrow in a manner not dissimilar to her youngest son, "If that is what 2000 years of human engineering looks like, you are definitely going in the trunk."

Together the family laughed.

One by one, his family members approached him, ending with his older sister who approached from where she had been standing happily beside her husband. She hugged him tight, "Try not to get into too much trouble, ok? Remember the family motto..."

"Don't embarrass the family," he muttered, allowing her to pull away.

To his surprise, even Thomas was here, looking a little worse for wear, but still here. He even smiled at Adam clapping him warmly on the back before backing away.

"If that communications system works as well as they say it will, I had better hear from you often, otherwise you're going to wish this thing had never left the atmosphere," his mother was saying, and he had no doubt that she would do exactly that.

He wouldn't have admitted it to anyone, but he had to wipe his eyes at least twice more before saying his final goodbyes and leaving them to take their seats. Cutting up another side row and towards the podium which had been placed at the front of the staging field, he walked towards his place. UN flags hung on either side of the stage, shimmering blue and flapping softly in an early morning breeze. Other crew officers were already beginning to assemble, so Lieutenant Vir followed their lead and quickly took his seat, rifling through the program that had been left on his chair, and groaned inwardly.

"Hell, did they invite the entire continent of North America to speak at this thing?" muttered one of the other officers.

Vir would wager to say the guy wasn't far off in his estimation. There were at least four pages of speeches scheduled, not to mention the opening ceremony which would drag on for at least an hour with bands, marching and gun tossing. Sure he had been involved in plenty of such performances, but he really wished today didn't have to include any of the ostentatious pomp and circumstance. He was well aware of the significance of today but he was equally aware of his excitement to just go.

After the current Minister of Intercontinental Trade, the Unified State Treasurer, the UN Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of Intercontinental Diplomacy, the first lady to the president of the UN, General Kallinger, Admiral O'Connor, and the Head of the Automatic Administration came a rather long winded speech from the current President of the UN, who didn't fail to remind everyone that his last act before finishing his term would be to usher humanity into the intergalactic age. Adam felt like he had been ushered into the age of boredom and kept tapping his foot impatiently and nervously against the ground. Every now and again he would glance over his shoulder at the Enterprise which was waiting patiently for them to end the nonsense and begin her much anticipated journey. Even some of the older, stuffier officers were growing impatient. If he closed his eyes and thought hard enough, he could just imagine the roaring of the engines and in turn his heart pounded even harder, but that only made his anticipation that much stronger.

"And now, it is with considerable pleasure and respect that I introduce our next speaker, the woman of the hour, the esteemed Captain Tala Kelly. Now, I hope she will forgive me, but I must tell you about one of my first encounters with Captain Kelly-"

His little anecdote dragged on for another 45 minutes and only briefly touched on the subject of Kelly's career. Lt. Vir had met her once in passing and researched her later on. Captain Kelly was a woman in her mid 40s with an army record spanning the last two decades. She had flown at the tail end of the last Pan-Asian war and had since been instrumental in quashing terrorist insurrection in three major areas, two in the eastern hemisphere and one in the western. She had a reputation for being steely and unflappable. She had been awarded a purple heart, the oldest military award in existence, and the newer but still prestigious Platinum Wings.

"May I present the commander of this glorious ship, Captain Tala Kelly." The crowd broke into a modicum of polite applause. The sun above was beginning to beat down on them and Lt. Vir had to wipe a bead of sweat from his forehead. Distantly he could hear the sound of crying babies and the muttering of conversation. This had been a VERY long ceremony and their tentative window for takeoff had long since past. His stomach rumbled. He had been too excited to eat this morning and thought they would have been on their way by now.

To the right of the podium a woman stood ramrod straight from her seat. Tala Kelly was a slight woman of 5'5" with ancestry that likely included Native American, East Asian, Islander, and or all of the above. She had thick dark hair which she kept pulled into a tight, clean bun at the base of her neck, and a set of cat-like auburn eyes. When she walked, she walked with the confidence of someone used to power, authority and intelligence, her posture rigid with head held high.

Lt. Vir watched as she stepped up to the lectern. Like the rest of them, she was wearing her class A dark grey uniform: cords, ribbons, medals and gloves. Light shone down on her from above. She placed one hand on the side of the lectern looking down at a set of three by five notecards cupped in her other palm; she stayed like that for a long moment, head bowed silent as the crowd shifted in anticipation.

She looked up and Lt, Vir braced himself, tired yet hungry to hear from his captain.

"I wanted to start ...by thanking everyone for coming on this pivotal occasion." She paused again. The entire staging ground was silent as they waited for her next words, but the silence dragged on and the crowd shifted rather awkwardly in their seats. Captain Kelly sighed audibly and then with a sudden expression of resolve neatly placed her cards in her uniform pocket. All around the crowd quacked with confused muttering, "Enough of this, I have waited two decades for this moment and I CANNOT wait another moment." She slammed her fists down on the podium, "Let's go to space!"

Lt. Vir could second that and stood from his chair clapping vigorously. To his surprise, others followed. The polite clapping from earlier had morphed into a thundering wave of sound: yelling, hooting, hollering and stamping feet. Adam let of a whoop of his own as Kelly turned to them and waved a hand, "To your stations, the lot of you."

The carefully printed and structured programs were left in discarded heaps and forgotten as a hundred men and women surged from their seats, all too eager to ignore the rest of the ceremony and get to work. The Secretary of the UN did his best to try and control the situation, but his voice was completely drowned out by the enthusiastic crowd.

-

The little military jeep couldn't have gone fast enough for Adam, though he had the presence of mind to turn and wave to his family one last time before being whisked away with similarly dressed and excited officers. The wind kicked up, tugging at his uniform and whipping his blonde hair into a spiked mess.

Before them, the massive ship expanded in his vision, dwarfing the launch pad and towering into the sky, a grey black behemoth crouched ready to catapult itself into the sky. All nonessential personnel had been aboard the ship for hours, readying her cargo for takeoff, checking and rechecking her systems, and preparing themselves for what was to come. Only the officers had been forced to attend the ceremony and after hours and hours of mind numbing boredom they were on their way.

At the head of the column of jeeps, Kelly stood straight, gripping the metal bar of the roll-cage with one hand and holding her hat in place with the other. A few loose strands of hair whipped wildly from under her cap as her shoulder cords vibrated frantically in the wind. Lt. Vir observed the Captain in admiration, she really fit the bill: calm, controlled, focused and a badass war hero to top it all off. What he wouldn't give to be more like her. But where Kelly was a stone cold badass, he was an overly emotional child with a serious geek complex.

The ship was a monolith in his vision now, looming high overhead, supported by huge landing struts, thicker and taller than some buildings. The large cargo ramp had been lowered, allowing the jeeps to roll forward and up into her cavernous insides. He stared at the underside of the ship, awed at how massive it was, spanning from one edge of his vision to the other, as large as a small town is wide. Together their small convoy entered the belly of the ship by way of the huge cargo ramp. The sun suddenly vanished behind one of the ship's massive struts and before long the entire landscape was blotted out as they entered into an absolutely massive cargo bay where a slew of non-coms were hurriedly stowing cargo and making last minute preparations for flight. Voices and commands issued over the intercoms or crackled from dozens of handheld radios. The officers leapt from the jeeps which were then quickly driven away to be stowed as the officers quickly moved off.

Lt. Vir hit the ground before his jeep stopped rolling forward. Even though he had spent hours training on the ship, he felt like it was his first time aboard with all the organized chaos and excitement. He ducked past a group of crewman rolling a large trolley full of crates.

"Lieutenant!"

He turned in a wide circle trying to find the voice and stopped with a grin as a familiar face appeared from the crowd.

The two men gripped hands warmly, "Captain Palmer."

"Chief Weapons Officer now, kid."

"Oh, congratulations. I didn't hear."

Chief Palmer waved a hand, "No big deal. You have any idea where you're going?"

"Afraid not sir.... I... I guess they neglected to give me a position during takeoff."

He shook his head, "No, that's why I'm here, you've been invited to the bridge."

Lieutenant Vir felt his heart leap into his throat. He tried to remain professional but he couldn't control the face splitting grin that cracked across his face. "Seriously?" Chief Palmer had to grab him by the shoulder as he nearly leapt back into another trolley.

"Lieutenant, I want you to take that energy and tone it down by a factor of 100. Can you do that for me? Good, and yes you have been invited to the bridge. I swear to the devil himself if you freak out at what I'm about to say next, I will push you into the next oncoming trolley, but this is a big deal. The Captain wanted me to solicit a few officers that could POTENTIALLY learn how to fly the ship." His hand gripped tighter as if he expected Adam to grow rockets and fly through the roof. He had good cause as Adam was feeling rather light, his head was spinning and his face hurt from grinning so much. Chief Palmer dragged him towards the edge of the cargo bay, "Look, kid, this is a big deal and a huge honor so when we get in there, sit down, shut up and don't bother anyone. Sit, watch, and maybe learn something."

Lieutenant Vir could only nod his head and attempt to control a spreading grin. He could just see it now...Captain Vir of the UNSC Enterprise, boldly going where no man had gone before...

He liked the sound of that.

His daydreams were quickly interrupted as they were joined by a second group of bridge officers talking animatedly with each other, discussing vectors, weather, and the proper application of the fusion engines and at what time. Adam had never felt so excited in his entire life. He was walking to the bridge with a group of officers who were all about to set off on the first interstellar journey. He needed to calm down before they rescinded the offer and left him outside the bridge.

The grey paneled corridors echoed with life as their boots clattered on metal catwalks, under which he could just barely discern the veins of the ship as pipes and wires were concealed beneath. The hall curved shortly around to the side, and they stopped to wait for a lift to the bridge.

The floor they came in on was occupied, primarily, by cargo storage areas, offices and equipment rooms for the various units. The deck below them held all the engineering, the deck above them would be primarily social crew quarters and living spaces, while above that was dedicated to administration and the bridge. Even from where he was, he could feel the soft rumble of the engines. While they weren't on, technically, they had been warming up over the past few hours.

The door to the elevator opened, and the group of them stepped in.

"Countdown in twenty minutes," came a broadcast.

Adam felt that familiar sensation just below his stomach, that same feeling that had plagued every major event in his life ever since his childhood. The horrific need to pee. He ignored it as the doors opened and he stepped with the other officers out onto the command deck, heading off towards the bridge. On either side they passed lines and lines of pressurized doors and additional crew members readying themselves for takeoff.

At the end of the hall, they came upon a set of pressurized double doors. They passed through a system of coded body scanners before the door opened to reveal a wide, circular room, crammed with screens, computers, chairs, and at the head, a single raised chair lording over the small sea of seats beneath. As they entered, the chair spun and Captain Kelly looked down at them. She had taken off her cap which was now resting lightly in her lap. Her bun was missing a few strands of hair which now framed her face. Lieutenant Vir felt his heart leap in another spasm of excited admiration. Sitting there, like she was now he couldn't have imagined anything more cool in a comic or a movie: the steely way her eyes passed over them, the slight smile that tugged at the corner of her mouth, the radiating confidence, the electric energy that emanated from her.

She looked at home, as if she had spent her entire life sitting in that seat.

"Chief Palmer,"

Together the group of officers snapped to attention.

"I'm glad you could make it." She said shortly before turning her seat back around. Just ahead of them there was a flicker and then a flash as the outer hull cameras engaged, giving them an elevated view of Cape Courage and the distant black line of ants; civilians scuttling around the hillsides to see the launch.

Together with Chief Palmer, Adam was ushered to the side of the bridge and into a seat in front of an ancillary screen. Chief Palmer engaged a button on the armrest of his seat and was immediately immobilized by a five point energy harness, similar to the ones in fighter jets. Lieutenant Vir followed suit, "Is the captain flying?" he wondered.

Chief Palmer shook his head and nodded to a man just to the right of her, "She can, but she's letting him do it, big honor."

Adam felt a momentary flash of envy, but was soon overcome with a feeling of pure excitement as the captain pressed the comm. button on the side of her chair. "Crew of the UNSS Enterprise, this is your captain speaking, countdown begins in five minutes. Stow all remaining unsecured items and strap in to a safety seat, this warning will not be made again."

Lights blinked on the communications station just to the right of the captain's chair, "Enterprise, this is Houston. Do you read? Over."

The communications officer looked to the captain, who nodded her go ahead, "Houston, we read you loud and clear."

"Excellent! Ground crews have vacated. Begin all safety procedures. You are cleared for go in five."

"Copy, preparing engines for go." The transmission cut off momentarily and Lieutenant Vir followed along in his little notebook as they began the last few steps of the preflight before launch. Just to his left, one of the radio technicians watched with bated breath.

"Start the ignition sequence."

Somewhere deep in the ship, Lieutenant Vir felt a rumbling that made him shake in his seat. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, feeling his insides begin a nervously excited churning. The vibrations grew, moving up his legs, back and eventually into his chest where he swore he could feel it in his very heart, and not in the metaphorical sense.

The bridge was a symphony of movement and voices as the crew prepared for takeoff. Constant communication passed between them and ground control.

"Charging engines."

"Engaging fusion containment."

"Securing Warp shield."

"Coolant systems charged to 20%."

To his right, Chief Palmer laughed and that made Vir grin. He looked back down at his little preflight book and checked off a few more markers as the ship rattled around him.

"Enterprise, begin countdown."

"Ignition, beginning in 10."

Below them, the engines continued to escalate in power, until he felt as if he was about to rattle from his seat and go vibrating across the floor. Inside his chest, his heart throbbed hard enough to push itself through the holes in his ribcage. He gripped the sides of his seat as he watched with wide eyes as the young pilot continued to read off the items, flipping switches, engaging levers and dials.

"Engines holding steady!."

"Coolant systems holding steady."

"Priming release."

"Seven."

He wasn't entirely sure if he was going to scream or throw up.

"Engaging exhaust valves," the entire ship's quaking turned into a vibration so powerful, the very plane of his existence seemed as if it was about to rattle itself apart.

"Rechecking engine angle."

"Four."

Outside, thousands of humans rose from their picnic blankets and camping chairs craning their necks and shading their vision as the distant, screaming of engines reached their ears. That distant screaming rose to a cacophonous roar despite which extended into the ground below their feet. Thousands of wide-eyed children were hefted on the shoulders of their parents as fire erupted from the engines and caused the warping of air around the truly astonishing ship. As the countdown continued, the crowd grew louder and louder, chanting along with the numbers that flashed on the screens of a thousand personal devices. All around them, the air rattled and vibrated as collective excitement was inhaled and exhaled with every breath.

Children clapped and reporters, flanked by armies of cameras, babbled in several different languages: modern English, Mandarin, Russian, Spanish Pan-European, Hindustani and Arabic, but they were drowned out by a wave of voices abounding in inarticulate joy.

-

"Igniting primary engines."

"Three."

His chest was tight, his breathing was almost nonexistent, he felt like he was sitting inside a dream, seeing things through a prism of glass, inside looking out.

"Two."

Captain Kelly leaned forward in her seat, stopped short by the harness. The engines reached a crescendo

"One."

"IGNITION!"

And then the engines completely cut, the rattling died, and all that was left was a dying whistle. The entire bridge exhaled before erupting into confused babblings. Outside, the fire had died, the chanting had fallen away into quiet disbelief as people stood wide eyed and confused craning their necks towards the distant launch field. Small children whined questions at their parents who just stared and wondered if they were a safe distance away if things continued to go south. The reporters broke into their live broadcasts with speculations and theories each hoping to win an award for covering maybe the biggest space disaster of all time.

"Ignition failure."

Lieutenant Vir strained forward in his seat feeling his heart sink into his stomach.

"What the hell just happened?" The captain demanded. "Why did MY ship just die?."

The pilot scrambled, looking at the dials, rechecking his preflight, "I have no idea!" he announced frantically.

"Give me a better answer."

"Enterprise, this is mission control, status?"

Captain Kelly angrily engaged the comm, "Primary engine failure, Houston. We're running a diagnostics check."

"Diagnostics are coming back negative, Captain."

"Get engineering on the comm," she ordered and after a moment there was a crackle over the intercom.

"Bridge, this is engineering. Why did you shut off the engines?"

Her captain's cap dropped to the floor, but she didn't seem to notice, "We didn't. The engines failed."

The engineers seemed confused, "Negative Captain, the engines shut off, but diagnostics say they are fine."

Lieutenant Vir looked down at his preflight checklist. Then quietly, so as not to disturb the rest of the bridge, he leaned to the side and towards one of the comms experts as Chief Palmer had joined the conversation to troubleshoot the issue. She leaned in to listen to him as he whispered, "Did you hear them engage the fusion lock?"

The woman shrugged, "I don't know, I was monitoring ATC chatter."

"Oh.... well maybe I just miss-"

The captain's chair swiveled around violently and her hawkish golden eyes fell on Adam. She stabbed a finger at him, "You, right there, what is your name?"

Lieutenant Vir looked to either side in confusion and shock assuming he would find someone sitting behind him. Hell, maybe he had dumbly sat in the lap of someone super important, but when he found no one he pointed to himself, "Uh... me ma'am?"

"Does it look like I am pointing at someone else, YES you."

"L-Lieutenant Vir, ma'am" he stammered.

"Yeah, cut the ma'am lieutenant, what were you just saying?" she demanded.

He fidgeted nervously in his seat, stammering and rubbing his palms together, "I uh.... um about what?"

"I heard you say something. What was it?"

The entire bridge turned to look at him now. He felt his palms go slick and his heart was hammering fit to burst through his ribcage as he racked his brains trying to figure out what he had been thinking. Those golden eyes narrowed the longer he stammered and he wondered if this is what Greek heroes felt right before medusa turned them to stone. He glanced down at his little notebook blushing. "I-I... uh," then his eye caught something on his list and with a welling of relief he remembered. He blushed again, "I.... well I was just asking if... if you had heard them engaging the f-fusion lock."

There was silence on the ship for a moment before the captain turned angry eyes towards the pilot who was feverishly working to understand the situation, "And what would happen if we forgot to engage the fusion lock...." it was clear by the expression on her face that she already knew the answer.

The man's lips quivered, "I... ur." His entire face was red. "The engines would engage an emergency shutoff sequence.... Captain."

"I think you should check."

The man's face was burning as he did, only going even redder as he verified his mistake.

"Did you just stall my ship...live...on the most important day in the history of humanity?" Her voice had lowered to dangerous levels of quiet.

"Sorry, captain," the man whispered.

She sat back in her chair, tight bun unraveling under the pressures of the day. A trickle of sweat ran down the side of her neck, but was only noticed by a young lieutenant sitting quietly to the side, "You cannot take the blame. I missed your mistake after all, but if you don't get my ship started in the next ten seconds," her voice was beginning to slowly raise, "I will let baby-face over there captain the ship since the rest of us can't seem to get our shit together!"

Lieutenant Vir cringed while watching as the poor pilot scrambled to restart the ignition sequence, checking and double checking each step under the urging of the captain.

"Enterprise, this is mission control. Be advised, we are initiating abort sequence."

Captain Kelly slammed her finger against the button. "The hell you are!" She took a deep breath, "Houston, we found the issue and are proceeding with launch."

"Say again."

"Proceeding with launch. Countdown in five..." she raised her hand into the air and began manually counting down, a silent threat to the pilot to get himself in gear. Lieutenant Vir bit his lip gripping the sides of his chair as the engines ignited for the second time.

"Three." Outside, the confused crowd began an unsure sort of clapping.

"Two."

"Come on...you can do it."

Vir desperately wanted to close his eyes, but as if watching a horrific car wreck, he just couldn't look away. Inside his innards churned with butterflies, his chest burned, and the nervous nausea from earlier again increased in intensity. Someone gripped his arm from the side and he glanced over to find Chief Palmer resting a hand on his shoulder giving him very serious look that probably translated to 'If you throw up on the bridge, I will reassign you to waste removal for the duration of this tour.'

But how could he stop the feeling. His biggest dream was so close... yet.... so far away.

This just had to work..

"One."

"Ignition."

This time, he FELT it as the engines caught. The sheer inconceivable power of the engines absolutely thundered up through the ship and thrust him back against the seat. The very air itself shattered around them and history was altered in a single moment of unadulterated power.

Outside, though he could not hear it, the uneasy clapping had erupted into a cacophonous outpouring of joyful triumph. A great swatch of humanity flew to their feet cheering and howling. All across the world they exclaimed their joy by rending the air with their voices and rattling the floor with their feet; in the open fields by Cape Courage/Canaveral, in kitchens, dorm-rooms, living rooms, laboratories, classrooms, libraries, restaurants, and bars. Great crowds screamed and stomped in the swirling snow, on sandy beaches and even on planes and in boats. Astronauts manning space stations, those on the moon, and thousands standing atop the ruddy surface of Mars screamed and chanted as the first intergalactic spaceship hauled itself into the sky on pillars of fire. The chanting grew and the screaming rose in pitch and intensity as the ship lumbered higher and higher into the sky accelerating faster and faster and faster.

Inside the ship, the crew was thrown back into their seats by the crushing weight of 3 Gs, not enough to pass out, but not entirely comfortable. The entire ship rattled so hard that Lieutenant Vir was having trouble seeing as his eyes bounced back and forth inside his head, but he didn't need to see and he didn't care. Barely audible over the sound of the engines, someone was laughing and suddenly he realized it was him. Euphoric with the same sensation that he had experienced during his first flight into space, a complete joy so profound that if he could have captured it and suspended time, he would have trapped himself there forever.

Eight minutes in and their flight slowly began to even out. The roaring of the engines died down to a distant rumble as the pilot slowly reduced engine speed rotating the thrusters to cut back and allow them to fall into the proper orbital speed before cutting the engines completely.

"Engaging artificial gravity."

There was silence on the bridge for a long moment as that familiar weightless sensation of space vanished, no match for the gravity fields.

"Enterprise, what is your position? Over."

Captain Kelly sat straight-backed in her seat, her coal black hair in sweaty tendrils about her face. A fact that, rather than detracting from her commanding presence, only added to it. She reached out with a steady hand, "Ground control, we have achieved orbit."

As the comm dropped, the crew simultaneously broke into a spontaneous celebration; cheering, laughing, stunned and in some cases crying. Chief Palmer slapped him on the back too overcome to speak. Lieutenant Vir just grinned, too dizzy with emotion to do much else.

"Don't start celebrating just yet!" The captain ordered and under the command of her voice the bridge went quiet as everyone turned to look up at her expectantly. The belt clicked as it retracted back into place and Captain Kelly stood from her seat, walking forward to brace her hands against the railing which separated her raised chair from the rest of the deck, "We know how to get to space. We have done it countless times before, but this mission isn't about getting to space, is it...this is about the first warp jump in history. Our first interstellar foray, so get your shit together, but rest assured we will celebrate once the next star we see isn't our own."

The bridge let of a short whoop of agreement and then got to work.

There wasn't a whole lot of time to waste. The captain wasn't exactly one for taking things slow and she must have been under the impression that the faster they defied death the better. With no need to pick up supplies, dock with another station, or even stop by the moon or Mars, the only thing to do was to get on their way.

Though the warp core had the theoretical potential to take them across the known universe, they had decided to start small by heading to the next closest star other than their own sun. Proxima Centauri was about 4.22 light years from earth and had the added bonus of Proxima B, a rocky world about 1.3 times the size of earth and theoretically with the potential to maintain life being tidally locked with the star. Though the strong solar winds would have a high likelihood of blowing away any habitable atmosphere and boiling off any sort of water that might manage to remain on the surface. Even so, the fact that there was even a SMALL possibility of there being life on this other planet was more than enough to make the trip worth it.

The elephant in the room plagued members of the crew at this moment. The likelihood that they were flying through space in a communal coffin was very high. Flight prerequisites included a will, a life insurance policy and final goodbye streams for their families, although all that was not publicized. No one knew exactly what would happen when they finally engaged the warp core. Of course, the scientists who invented it, including Dr. Bernthal himself, were theoretically sure that the core could fold the space in half effectively cutting the distance by more than a trillion and allowing travel across the universe in a timely manner allowing members of the crew to return to Earth within the next few months of leaving. However, there was the miniscule possibility that engaging the warp core would end up creating a singularity that would eventually turn itself into a micro black hole which would effectively destroy everyone aboard the ship.

Most of the crew tried not to think about that possibility as they plotted their course out of orbit and into the most empty part of their solar system possible. While it was possible they would be sucked into the singularity of a miniscule black hole, it was also possible that the warp core would set off a fusion explosion powerful enough to equal the output of red dwarf stars like Proxima Centauri. So there were a lot of things to think about, but the one weighing the most on the command staff was the possibilities which would come if this actually did work

He supposed that was one of the reasons Captain Kelly was so eager to forge ahead. The less time the crew had to think and maybe the less time she had to think, the less likely they would be to second guess their decision to be space guinea pigs.

It took under an hour to plot their course out of orbit and before he could really comprehend the magnitude of where they were, they were heading deeper and deeper into space. From the ground, their travel was being monitored and tracked. Hundreds of pictures of their departure had been sent back to the Earth from the moon and posted to the internet before they were really well on their way. After that, satellites, high powered telescopes and finally their own cameras began charting their travels, sending a full report back to earth which was then released to the public, keeping everyone updated on their course.

-

Lieutenant Vir had once again found himself standing on the bridge of the ship by way of invitation, this time from the captain herself. The very thought was enough to give him a stomach full of butterflies, cheeks flushed with excitement and eager dreaminess. Not that he hadn't felt like that all day. In fact, he had spent more than a couple hours just sitting on the observation platform staring awed and wide-eyed out at space. At first, he had watched Earth slowly recede in his vision until it was indistinguishable from the surrounding stars and then he had simply rested his head against the glass, eyes daydreaming.

He hadn't been the only one, others had come and gone to stare in awe at the scene before them, but he had remained the longest.

That was until he had received a summons to the bridge and quickly scrambled to follow orders, worried that if he didn't get there fast enough they would find someone to replace him. He arrived on the bridge as things were picking up and stood awkwardly in a corner of the room. The bridge crew spoke quickly to each other as comms to ground control still monitored their progress.

The captain gave orders and gathered information from members of the crew about their current progress. A holographic projection reminding him vaguely of Star Wars flickered before the captain's chair, displaying the chief engineer as he discussed warp protocol with her and her advisors. He overheard them considering the current state of the warp core and the credible possibilities of what would happen if even a single thing went wrong. The room was electric with nervous anticipation for the crew also knew what would happen if anything went wrong even though they didn't voice their concerns.

Outside, distant stars winked at them from the matte-black void of space. The long arm of the milky way glinted in shades of delicate white as one of the spiral arms of their galaxy rotated past. Chief Palmer was there too, sitting to the side of the captain and occasionally adding his input to their current flight plan. Lieutenant Vir was beginning to wonder if he had been called here by accident just as the Captain turned around and caught his eye.

She motioned him over. He hurried over, quickly snapping to attention.

"At ease," she barked waving him off, "Lieutenant Vir, is it?"

"Yes ma'am.... I.... its an honor-"

"Get to know me a bit longer kid and we will see. Now, tell me how do you know so much about flying."

He stood straighter now, still a bit star struck but trying not to show it. "I've been flying since my sophomore year of high school, ma'am. Graduated from the Air Force's new Trans-Space Combative Aviation Academy."

She frowned slightly, "Yes- I recall...Air Force called you guys Cherubs or something."

He awkwardly rubbed the back of his head, "Well yeah...that's because how young we were..."

"And what exactly can you fly?"

"The better question is what can't I fly," she raised an eyebrow and he blushed. "I uh.... I didn't mean it like that. I...I was trained on all simulations, but my favorite was always the F-90 Darkfire. Name it ma'am and I can fly it: rocket, space shuttle, troop transport, helicopter, civilian transport, paper airplane," when no one smiled at his little joke he wilted a bit. "I was being trained on the simulations for this ship a few months before takeoff, ma'am."

She looked him over, "Alright, Lieutenant," she pointed towards one of the seats near the flight console, "You'll be copiloting with 1st Lieutenant McMillen, don't touch anything, just make sure he doesn't forget anything. I'd do the piloting myself, but my job here is to oversee the rest of the bridge crew."

His heart hammered in his chest, "Yes ma'am, of course." He hurried towards the chair and almost immediately caught his boot on a lip of metal. He flailed about for a second and had to catch himself on the back of the chair, feeling stupid and wishing he could sink through the floor.

Captain Kelly raised an eyebrow and leaned towards Chief Palmer, "Let's hope the boy flies better than he walks."

Palmer snorted, "Don't worry Captain. The boy doesn't just fly well, he flies like god gave him six wings and a jetpack."

She glanced over at him with a question.

Palmer shrugged, "Another time."

-

He thought the launch had been a big deal, but as it turned out the great possibility of death was a great deal more serious. The Enterprise, the ship that was going to change the future, hung suspended in the darkness of space. Their distant star cast a delicate film of white radiation across one side of their ship while the other side was plunged into darkness. All the lights aboard the bridge had been dimmed as main power had been rerouted to the warp core.

The crew had been ordered into their positions. All personnel had been pulled from the engine room and it's surrounding compartments. Everything that could be strapped down was strapped down, but just in case helmets had been provided for the crew. Lieutenant Vir had chosen to wear his flight helmet and was rather thankful for the cool flow of oxygen as the room around him seemed unusually hot, but then again maybe that was just him.

The captain finished her last announcement to the crew before letting go of the comm. The rest of the bridge crew was uncharacteristically quiet except for the soft muttering of voices from the communication consoles. Lieutenant Vir sat behind the acting pilot with his checklist in hand as they moved slowly down the instructions.

"Ready?" Captain Kelly barked and the two young pilots glanced at each other before responding, "Yes, ma'am!"

"Ground control, this is Enterprise initiating warp sequence" The captain announced.

They waited, "Enterprise, this is ground control. Cut power and begin warp sequence."

Main lights on the ship winked out and the dull red emergency lights blinked on above their consul.

"Navigation, check our course."

"Course set for Proxima Centauri's outside orbital field."

Captain Kelly's knee bounced almost nervously against the floor, "Check it again, and then re-check it. The last thing I want to do is materialize in the center of Proxima Centauri itself."

Navigation did as told, "Ground control, send us those coordinates one more time."

Once those returned, Kelly ordered them to recheck the course one more time. The bridge was nearly silent but for her voice.

"Disengaging warp block," Lieutenant Vir said reading out from his list. "Charge coolant systems to 100%. Disengage power dampener, open warp bay doors," he went down the list with the other pilot parroting back his instructions. Captain Kelly watched them like a hawk from her seat. Lights blinked and flashed in the darkness around them. It was as if the ship itself was holding her breath.

"Begin warp core. Charge to 20% test."

The other pilot did as instructed and deep below them they felt the thrum as the warp core awoke. It was a different sensation than the engines, almost like a heartbeat...whomp ...whomp...whomp, and with each rotation the deck below their feet vibrated. It was a slow thing at first, thrumming through the ship every couple of seconds.

Lieutenant Vir raised his eyes, imagining the core rotating slowly inside it's casing, casting bright blue light in beams of pure power through the room with each slow rotation.

"Forty Percent."

Whomp whomp whomp

"Charging to sixty percent."

Whompwhompwhompwhomp

The entire ship was pulsing and beating now. Lieutenant Vir almost dropped his notebook. The air around them was palpable with vibrations, that seemed to move and displace the world around them. He had the sudden sensation of extreme vertigo. Somewhere on the bridge, someone groaned.

"Engines," Kelly ordered above the noise.

"Stable."

"Coolant?"

"Within acceptable ranges ma'am."

The captain took a deep breath, closing her eyes to calm a racing heart. This was it, if she issued the order, she would either usher the inhabitants of Earth into a new age or she would kill a thousand people because of a mad desire.

"Charging eighty percent," the rotation of the warp core could no longer be parsed out as individual sounds, but the distant palpitations had turned into a continuous thrum. The red emergency lights seemed to pulse and shift.

"Ninety percent."

Lieutenant Vir gripped the sides of his seat. His heart was beyond hammering and yet he could barely feel it beating over the rotation of the engines.

"100%"

Captain Kelly didn't waste time, "Warp!"

The pilot thrust the lever forward and their entire plane of existence ruptured, peeling itself like sloughing skin. His vision elongated and stretched, things far away appeared closer and things close were far away. His body rebelled as before them a dark hole materialized in space, the light around it warped moving up and around the sides like water dripping upwards. Their ship was reflected and mirrored over and over and over again on it's concave surface. Someone screamed, Lieutenant Vir couldn't find his own lungs to make any noise at all. Light grew in intensity and frequency. Ten ships were reflected back at them all going in ten different directions and suddenly that number multiplied. They were flying through a house of mirrors; squished, then elongated and finally warped. Light swirled around the dark abyss which stretched out before them. Thousands of ships, stars and lights rolled around them, repeating faster and faster and faster until their dimension shattered into a thousand pieces of glass to be thrown back at them. He tried to lift his hands, but couldn't feel them.

Panic set in, but he couldn't have said how long it took, seconds, years. The world about him tilted horrifically to one side casting the strange into a horrific parody of itself. When he could feel his muscles, he felt them spasming and relaxing repeatedly as if his brain was no longer in control of his body. He tried to lift his hand again, but felt as if it was strapped down. Then he watched as it rocketed upwards, like he didn't own it. The dark hole grew larger in his vision, the maw of the universe opening to eat them.

He heard someone weeping.

His eyes grew wide staring into the mouth of a horrible beast..

Which then snapped shut.

-

He roused to the horrible sound of someone losing their lunch. His entire body was on fire. Sweat dripped from his hairline and down his back. He opened his eyes thinking for a moment he was blind before his brain finally figured out how to interpret the scene before him. His head was lolling heavily against one shoulder and he was breathing in hard, shallow bursts. His skin was covered in a slick layer of wetness.

The air was hot, almost unbearably hot and he was sweating profusely. A whimper escaped from him as he tried sitting up. His body was slow, sluggish and confused in response, so he over corrected, flopping in his seat like a dead fish. His head turned towards where Captain Kelly slumped against her harness. Her hair was stringy and wet, she looked sick as struggling to sit up. She tried to speak, but the words didn't make any sense. Perhaps his ears weren't working. When he finally sat up, the pilot to his right was just coming too as well, accidentally ramming his hand into the console.

"Shit!" It was the first word he understood out of everything and glanced over to see the first pilot tugging at his pant leg, "Damn it."

"What?" he slurred.

"I...I think I pissed myself."

That revelation was surprising, but not half as surprising as realizing that he was still alive. The other pilot glared at him as he began to laugh, long and loud with a relief so profound he couldn't stop himself. Eventually the other pilot joined in unable to help himself until the entire bridge was a mess of confused ,weepy laughter.

Captain Kelly was the first to gain her feet, staggering to stand up. She tried to lean against the rail but yelped in pain and dragged her hand away, "Why the hell is it so hot in here? Get me engineering."

For one horrible moment there was no answer, but then a groggy panting voice came over the line, "What is going on?" she barked.

"Sorry Captain, the coolant system.... Overloaded." More panting. "110 degrees in engineering and there was no place for the excess heat to go. We are...working on getting something done, but half my crew is still, incapacitated and the other half...well, we aren't doing so great either."

Lieutenant Vir had gained enough of his own sense back to realize the other pilot's earlier issue was...well, it wasn't just a personal problem. He cursed. You'd think years of flying would have helped him learn to control his own bodily systems, but apparently it very much had not. He would probably omit this part if he ever talked to anyone about it ever again.

Of course, like a badass, Captain Kelly didn't appear to look anything more than cinematically disheveled, "Get me a location. The rest of you run diagnostics on your systems. Make sure we didn't lose anything.

The crew got to work, checking and rechecking their assigned operations.

"All systems are functioning Captain. Engines are a slightly overheated, same with

the warp core, but as long as we don't have to move anytime soon, I think we should be ok."

Lieutenant Vir shifted uncomfortably in his seat, wet and muggy.

"Data coming in, Captain...that...right behind us... it's Proxima Centauri.... we .... WE DID IT!"

This time she didn't scold them for cheering and he even saw her draw in a deep steadying breath before she cracked a smile.

They were in another solar system under the light of a new star, the furthest away from home anyone had ever gone and they had survived. They had just made history and earned themselves a mention with the likes of Gagarin, Shepard, Tereshkova and Glenn.

But damn it was hot and here he was, in his finest moment, sitting in wet clothes of his own making.


	20. Chapter 20

WARNING: The human body contains more bacterial cells than it does human cells. Sensitive species beware, for humans are a walking bio-hazard containment breach. 

-

Dr. Krill was escorted from the bridge to the medical bay on wobbly legs by the captain who seemed to be demonstrating a strange sort of concern for him. Its soft rubbery skin felt strange and alien against Krill's harder dermal layer as the human led him down the halls, completely nonplussed by their earlier warp. Krill was still trying to reorient himself after the violent phasing of reality, while the human barely looked inconvenienced.

He wondered if humans were even capable of feeling the effects of phasing reality, or if they possessed an adaptation that allowed for the flagrant abuse of warp methods. It couldn't have been their internal structures as their organs floated freely inside their abdomen attached to walls by a simple layer of sacking and tissue. Honestly, they should at least experience some digestive distress as a result.

He glanced over at Vir, eyeing his uncaged abdominal area and imagining pounds of internal organs suspended carelessly. A tough fibrous layer of muscle and a dermal layer that could be pierced with less than a pound of pressure were the only things stopping them from slopping out onto the cold floor.

The thought was disturbing.

For a moment, Krill entertained the idea that the structure of the brain was the reason for their strange immunity to the warp, but then shot down his own idea upon realizing that the human brain was suspended in a soup of spinal fluid and had free reign to ricochet around the skull as it so pleased.

He eyed the squishy creature with greater clinical detachment and the more he looked the more convinced he was that this creature shouldn't be as durable as it was. Most other creatures in the galaxy that showed the same measure of resilience tended to be barely past sentient with legs like thick stumps and bodies that were coated in a fibrous hide that only high-powered lasers, saws or other advanced technology could easily get through. But here was this squishy, rubbery, flexible creature held together with the biological equivalent of string, wire and industrial adhesive.

They stopped at the door to the infirmary, Krill held up by the human's hand as the doors hissed open and they stepped inside. The medical staff barely bothered to look up at them, all except for the physician's assistant who glowered over at them with barely concealed annoyance.

The Captain did not seem phased, whether he chose to ignore her scowl based on some sort of primitive dominance or he was just too stupid to pick up on the social cue, Krill did not know. However, after spending time with the captain, he was leaning heavily towards the latter option. Still ignoring the glare, the human dragged Krill across the open floor to stop before those cold, dark eyes.

"Just realized, I neglected to introduce the two of you. Rita, this is Krill. Krill this is Rita. She's been on my crew since the beginning, a real trooper sh-"

"Oh shut up, what do you want?" Rita demanded, crossing her arms over her chest. Krill couldn't keep his eyes from fixating on the undulation of corded muscle below her chin and under her skin.

"Why do you always have to assume that I want something when I compliment you?" The captain playfully grouched, smiling as always.

"Because people aren't just nice to each other. There is always a motive."

The corners of his mouth turned down into a "frown", "Now that is a very sad way to live life, quite pessimistic. You should get out more, have some fun."

She raised an eyebrow, "Like you?"

"Exactly."

"So I should go become an amputee and then poke my eye out. Is that what you're saying?" Krill shifted uncomfortably between the two humans sensing an argument, but to his surprise there was none as the captain just continued to smile.

"Would definitely be an improvement," he ran a hand through his hair. "I mean just look at your role model."

She rolled her eyes, hard. Krill was just beginning to understand the movement. The sclera, or white portion of a human eye, seemed to be very important in bodily communication. To flash someone the sclera seemed to be...an insult? No, more an admonishment or a distrust.

The captain allowed his smile to drop a little, patting Krill on the back, "No, I am not looking for any favors, but it is time to train your new doctor. Technically you will oversee him until he can stand on his own two...er...four feet." Technically one of his feet would actually be called a tarsus, but that was beside the point.

Rita sighed, shoulders slumping, eyes turning towards the sky.

"Very well," she consented to the ceiling before turning to look down at Krill, sweeping her hand to motion around the room. "You might as well get acquainted with the equipment". The captain stepped back and Krill was forced to follow the lead of the cantankerous human, now significantly worried that this human was more threatening than the captain.

"First, we have the medical beds, no fancy anti-gravity systems here. Generally, we position them like this, making it easier for our patients to breathe. To operate the bed just press these buttons right here: up, down, feet, head. This is their call button so they can get us if they have any issues." She opened a drawer beside the bed, "Here are some things we like to have on hand: Epi, suturing kit, forceps, catheters, syringes, different needle gages, etc. etc. You'll learn the function of each instrument soon enough." She turned to the side of the bed and pulled a small monitoring machine away from the wall. It swung toward her easily as it was attached to a rotating arm. "This is our heart monitor, pulsox, EKG, EEG, and BP machine all rolled into one. It can monitor other stuff as well; all these leads attach to the patient. Again, we will train you in the function and application of each instrument." She continued her tour of the room, and Krill looked on in a strange amalgamation of fascination, confusion, and horror.

It was all so primitive.

For crying out loud, they were still using magnets and radiation to see inside the body and there were no sterilization fields. It seemed as if he was going to have to learn how to be a doctor, again. He recognized none of the equipment and upon realizing that he became very grateful that he had four separate cortical hemispheres, an eidetic memory, and was a genius.

"That is, effectively, all the equipment we generally use. However, there are a few other things-" Krill stopped paying attention a moment later as a strange rushing sound came to him from behind a door to his left. He turned his head in confusion and surprise, stepping a bit closer to figure out what it was. He would have assumed it was water, but that seemed a little bit strange. After a few seconds, the door hissed open and Krill had to scamper backwards as the Captain nearly tripped over him. The human made a strange high-pitched barking noise staggering to the side and grabbing the door frame for support. Krill had yet to hear a human make that noise, paired as it was with wide eyes and raised eyebrows. He determined, after a moment, that it was probably some kind of warning call or startle response.

The man put a hand over his chest sagging against the doorframe. The smile had returned, "Mother f-.... Shiz, Doc you startled me." He straightened himself up adjusting his clothing. "You better be glad I was just coming out and not going in, or I would have needed a new pair of pants."

Krill stared at him unblinkingly. Then with curiosity he peeked behind the human's legs and into the other room. The floor was almost completely white with silver bars circling the room. There were two white basins, one full of water, and a biohazard bin. A mirror hung over one of the basins, at your average human's facial height. In the far corner, there was a small area sectioned off by a glass partition. A strange flexible metal tube hung on a peg next to the wall, and on the floor below that, a silver metal grate covered a hole.

"And.... what is this equipment?" he queried.

The captain turned to look back into the room and immediately his hand moved to the back of his neck. Krill was then surprised a second later as the human's skin changed color. It was so unexpected that he took a step back. He wasn't aware that humans had the ability to change their skin tone. Granted, it was a very subtle thing, the translucent white of his skin suddenly flooded with a reddish undertone.

He worried that it was some sort of warning signal. Was the human about to attack him? But no, the human didn't. The captain crossed one hand over his body and continued to rub the base of his neck. The shoulders hunched inward ever so slightly as if he was protecting his internal organs. These actions displayed a sense of unease or apprehension so why would the humans be doing it now?

"Er...uh.... you know what..." he looked towards Rita. "I just remembered all the captainy stuff I have to do; you know like captaining, and being the captain, so," he scooted past Krill and out onto the floor, "I give you the honor of explaining the-" he raised his hands making a strange motion with two fingers of each hand as he spoke, "'equipment' to our new friend."

He moved towards the door and Rita sighed. "Coward," she called after him.

Krill did not understand the term.

The human peered back around the door, his body already in the hallway, "Yes, yes I am. A very specific subset of coward called, a social coward." He made another strange motion with a single hand snapping sharply away from his temple. "Have fun kids," and then he disappeared into the hallway.

Krill looked over at Rita who was glaring after the captain, "I was unaware humans could change color."

Rita tilted her head brows furrowed, "What? No, we can't."

Krill looked back at her with a confusion which matched her own, "Yes you do. I just saw it. He turned red...or his skin's hue turned scarlet."

Rita paused, the corners of her mouth turned down as her head tilting in one direction, lips drawing together, the skin over her cheeks growing tight. "We cannot change color. What you saw there was as a result of blood flow increasing to the face and neck. It happens when someone is embarrassed."

"Embarrassed," Krill repeated.

"Yes."

He stared at her blankly, "I do not understand this word. It does not translate."

Rita stared at him, "Your species does not get embarrassed?"

"I would think that my sudden confusion would make that relatively evident."

The human just stared at him, "Kinda hard to believe, doc. EVERYONE knows what embarrassment is."

Krill remained silent.

"Embarrassment is when you do something socially unacceptable in front of other people. It can be when you say or do something inappropriate around people or you see someone else say or do something socially inappropriate."

Krill understood now, "Ah, that is why I do not understand. MY species does not possess the social rules that your species must adhere to so we cannot have embarrassment. Our social structure is based on survival, proliferation and advancement, our roots are in logic, while your structure is based primarily on sociability, pack economics, and hierarchy." Krill glanced towards the side room, "What social rule did he break?"

The corner of Rita's mouth twitched, "It wasn't him, it was you."

Krill looked stared at her in disbelief, "How interesting. What did I do?"

"You asked about something that is going to be very awkward to explain," she sighed.

"Awkward?"

Rita groaned but plunged on as she was not one to shy away from hard things, "Awkward is similar to embarrassment if not the same in most situations. You have asked a question that is going to be very uncomfortable because socially it is not appropriate to talk about with a stranger. Furthermore, the way you will likely react which will cause me to feel embarrassed."

Now this was getting strange, "You are already embarrassed about something I MIGHT do or say? How could you ever hope to predict that? Why would you stress over something that may not even happen?"

"Isn't that one of the great questions of life," she muttered under her breath.

"What was that?" Krill asked.

The human cleared her throat and sat down on one of the beds, "I mean, that seems very hypocritical of you."

"I am not a hypocrite."

"Mmm-hmmm," that was yet another new human sound he hadn't yet heard. A modulated humming noise, matched with a raised eyebrow and crossed arms. IF he could wager a guess as to what it meant he would have to go with skeptical. When he stood his ground she just sighed, "Tell me doctor, what is your species base: plant, animal or fungus?"

"Depends on your definition."

"What do you consume for life and what are the waste products as a result?"

"Sunlight and carbon, the byproducts are oxygen, I suppose the shedding of outer layer dermal cells count as well."

A couple of other humans had approached to listen in on their conversation, some being more discreet about it than others.

Rita leaned back against a table arms crossed over her chest, "A plant then. Humans are consumers, animals if you must know. We have to and can eat one of a few things: plants, their byproducts, or other animals. However, only a portion of that substance can be absorbed into and utilized by the body, so that which cannot be used and other toxins produced by the body during that intervening time must be expelled. It's what happens when you are a consumer species, you have more waste to get rid of, both liquid and solid forms so that's what that room is for. Waste disposal."

Krill had to think about that for a moment, "Ah, yes of course. I was aware of that, I have had Tesraki patients before."

"Good," she relaxed.

"Though of course I have never actually seen this process-"

The humans' reactions were confusing and varied: some raised their hands covering their faces, some made that strange revving noise while others vocalized long drawn out guttural noises.

"Not very quick are you? I am going to stop you right there and say that you will not be witnessing the use of that room, personally, ever..."

"Why not?"

"You see this, this is what I saw coming. Embarrassment, especially for me. First of all, it's a matter of personal privacy which humans take very seriously," she began. All around her the other humans were behaving strangely. A few of them were smiling very toothily at him seeming to be enjoying themselves, a few others had slunk off, skin changed by the blood flow to their faces. So many different reactions he was unable to discern that he was having a hard time categorizing them all.

"Why?"

"You certainly need to learn human social clues," she growled in frustration when he didn't relent. "Because...It's hard to explain."

A grinning human piped up, "Because doc, it's a very very vulnerable position to be in when someone else is around. From an evolutionary standpoint, it leaves you open to attack from predators."

"I thought you were the predators?" Krill cut in in confusion.

"Not always and surely not the biggest or the meanest. Second, human culture has placed great emphasis on the wearing of clothing, this stuff you see covering our outer dermal layer. The height of trust, is to allow someone to see you without any on, which is not only physically vulnerable but emotionally as well. In fact, we have a saying for this, 'catching someone with their trousers down' which just means catching someone at their most vulnerable. So it is extremely inappropriate to walk in on someone during this time."

Looking at the human, he didn't seem particularly embarrassed by the conversation, otherwise he wouldn't be smiling so much.

"Well said Jim," Rita finished, "but there is one more point that may be the most important, the process is actually pretty disgusting. You will come to find that humans are...well, nasty. Bodily fluids and solids are smelly, noisy and in this case it is also a biohazard concern. Human internal organs have more bacteria in them then there are individual cells on the human body."

That made Krill step back in shock and horror, suddenly glad that as a plant he was not generally susceptible to animal disease

"They don't hurt us, but help us digest food. However, once outside the body, they are not meant to come in contact with the mouth. Rivers and drinking water contaminated with human waste can kill thousands and spread disease in epidemic proportions, the biggest one being cholera, though we haven't seen an outbreak of that for centuries. What you see in that room is our process for removing the waste and destroying bacteria. The waste is disposed of and then hands are washed to avoid the spread of germs."

"That is rather disgusting," Krill added.

"Disgusting is an apt word and so now I hope you are beginning to understand why we have separate, private rooms for this, although I am sure that many of our orderlies will allow you to relieve them of bedpan duty if you truly want to witness waste removal," Rita half 'smiled' while many of the onlookers actually broke into huge grins or made that throaty noise.

"Do I even want to know what the thing in the corner is for?"

Rita glanced inside, "Ah, actually that's fine. Follow me." She walked him into the room, which he, for some reason, now found oddly uncomfortable. He eyed the oval basin a few feet to his right like it was going to come to life and spew infectious material all over him. Some of the humans who had left earlier returned to peer through the door, watching as Rita reached inside the glass container and turned a knob. Above them there was a sharp hiss and water began falling from the nozzle and onto the floor draining back into the interior of the ship, "This is meant to deal with other dirt, dead dermal cells, or other contaminants. It is called a shower. Human skin produces oil to avoid cracking and so does the hair. Bacteria grows on the skin and both must be washed away for hygiene purposes which is done using water and chemical compounds."

Krill started, "How often are these things preformed?"

Rita shrugged, "Depends, the shower is generally used once a day but it depends on activity level and activity performed. The use of the other facility which we call a toilet varies widely: solid waste disposal is one to three times daily while liquid waste can fluctuate greatly depending on the consumption of liquid, activity level, and health. You will become intimately acquainted with each as we take samples of both materials to analyze bacterial presence and a host of other levels in order to treat or diagnose."

She turned off the water, shook off her hand and walked from the room closing the door behind them. Krill saw the humans differently now. In essence, they were just squishy sacks of bacteria and disease lugging around pounds and pounds of biohazardous material inside their fleshy unprotected innards, a fact that made Krill uncomfortable. He was starting to feel inadequate, a feeling he did not like. Bacteriology, a branch of microbiology, was not a science he was entirely familiar with as it was not a necessary science for many of the life forms he usually tended to.

"Let's be fair though, most human waste products can be hazardous, even to us. Saliva is extremely disgusting and contains bacteria that, when exposed to an open wound can eventually lead to bacterial infection. Urine is sterile, but that is assuming it does not contain blood, which in hospitals is all too common. Sweat isn't generally an issue except for the areas of the skin where bacterial growth is common, specifically under the arms or around the groin. Blood contains diseases and will be an issue if you aren't careful. Personally, the only bodily fluid that I tend to trust is tears but in a hospital setting, even that is suspect." Krill was starting to become concerned that he did not have the right credentials to treat this species. Even the humans seemed wary around their own species, acting like each other was just a toxic mass of gooey disease.

This revelation made him uncomfortable, so he changed the topic.

"How many sexes does your species have?" he questioned. He knew of two, but he was aware of certain animal species that could have up to four.

Rita took a seat on, "Two to put it simply, but based on genetics you can have a human that presents as being in between in one aspect or another, or even the opposite of the chromosomal structure. These are very rare of course. In general, you have XX and XY, one incubates the offspring and one fertilizes the egg. Of course with advances in science-" she paused and tapped her foot on the ground, "That's probably enough to start with." She stopped, looking at him rather thoughtfully, "Wait, do other species have more than two biological sexes?"

Krill looked at her in amusement, "Generally two is common, but three has been known to occur and four is theoretically plausible in certain smaller species. My species has only one sex."

He paused as Rita stared at him with wide eyes, "Only one?" she seemed surprised, "as in you are both male and female?"

Krill simply smiled, "No, I am neither male nor female for neither of them exist on my planet. I am capable of both producing and fertilizing eggs, though the production of eggs is a longer process that requires more time and conviction, so I have never personally chosen to produce eggs."

"So what am I supposed to call you? I've been saying he, but I guess that isn't quite accurate. My apologies if I have been using the wrong pronoun. What would you prefer I use?"

"It does not matter what you call me however, in the past I have taken up the title of the male in a species considering I have never produced eggs, which is more common among female members of certain species." He tilted his head thoughtfully, "He will be perfectly acceptable."

The once annoyed and cantankerous human had allowed that aspect to fade and now looked at him with some measure of interest, her anger having been taken over by curiosity. "How very interesting," she muttered to herself. "So you can just get it on with anyone and end up with kids?"

He stared at her, "Sometimes I wonder if you are actually speaking this 'English' of yours."

"You can mate with anyone?"

"Theoretically I can, but I would never do that," he said vigorously shaking his head at her. The audacity of the thought incomprehensible.

Her head tilted the other way, a strange expression of curiosity that seemed common among humans, "And why not?"

Kill looked at the poor naive human and shook his head, "There is a difference between CAN and SHOULD of course. For instance, I would never waste my genetic material on a delta of my species, it just wouldn't be proper at all and it would hardly be useful in the proliferation of my species."

"A delta?" The human wondered.

"Of course you are ignorant when it comes to any knowledge of my species so I will explain." Even more humans had gathered around to hear him speak and he found himself surprisingly pleased with the larger audience. He had never been allowed to pass on his knowledge to others, that had not been his job. Aside from the almost illegal papers he had written for the medical community, this was his only experience in actually teaching. "Every season a carefully selected group of us is chosen to participate in a mating duty. The group is then split in half; half to lay the eggs and the other half to fertilize them. The eggs are very very delicate once fertilized and the slightest error can suspend development. There are four general stages of development with each containing subsets. If the egg is disturbed in the first quartile the Vrul will be born as a Delta, this is characterized by severe mental stunting resulting in a condition not dissimilar to catatonia. These deltas are generally short, strong, ugly, stupid and they have no helium sacks. They are used entirely for menial or physical tasks like cleaning or building." He was almost pleased with himself as he watched the wide eyed humans lean in a little closer. "In the second quartile you would get a Kappa, obviously smarter and more attractive than the others, but they are vapid and childish. They are very good for delicate repetitive tasks. A Beta which comes from the third quartile is probably as intelligent as your average human and are quite common."

The humans sat back in bemusement. Krill didn't notice the somewhat skeptical looks on their faces and continued, "Not astonishingly bright but not dumb either. They can perform any average task of significance and many of them can perform complex tasks and solve complex issues that is why they are so common. They tend to be very good with numbers and make up the bulk of our community."

The corner of Rita's mouth flexed upwards a tiny bit, "And what are you?"

"Well an alpha of course. You don't become the universe's greatest surgeon with average intelligence."

A human leaned over towards his friend elbowing him in the ribs and whispering, "He's going to have an aneurysm when he learns what my grades were at the army medical academy."

The other man snorted, "Heh yeah, but we all know military intelligence is an oxymoron. You'd be let in simply for knowing your ass from hot lard." He was punched lightly on the arm, but came away rubbing his arm and grinning.

Luckily for him, Krill didn't understand any of what he was saying and simply continued, "There are a couple levels of alpha even though they are very hard to fabricate as the eggs have to be in the exact, perfect environment and most of the time it is more luck than anything else, despite all of our scientific knowledge. Alphas become our political leaders, inventors, doctors, academics and researchers to name a few. My personal theory is that an alpha has the capability to think past what is necessary and create new ideas, not possible in any other level of my species, but I still feel it is something that most Vrul alpha struggle with."

The human expelled a long gust of air from her nose, "That makes a lot of sense doc, explains everything."

"Explains what?"

"The fact that you are the dumbest smart being I have ever met."

For some reason he had a feeling that that was supposed to be an insult, but couldn't entirely parse out how someone who was smart was also supposed to be dumb. Those two things were mutually exclusive. You couldn't be a dumb, smart person. So which one did she really mean?

By the end, they just sort of stared at each other until the human gave up, rolling her eyes back to stare at the sky. "Heaven almighty above, give me strength," she muttered before sighing. "Anyway, that is sort of the crash course on the infirmary. I will probably have you learning on the job for the next few months before I give over total control. I want to make sure you know what the hell you are doing before I actually let you run this place."

The doctor looked at her with some measure of amusement, "I think that I can handle your barbaric little system just fine. As a matter of fact, once I understand your rudimentary medical procedures and learn a little more about human anatomy I am sure I will quickly replace it with my own far superior knowledge bringing you into a new age of advanced medicine."

She leaned back arms crossed over her chest protecting her vital organs chin down, "I am going to wager to guess that you don't have many friends on your planet."

Krill stared at her. As their species was not particularly social, only out of necessity rather than biologically, he had only a passing understanding of what the word meant, "We do not need friends on my planet."

"How about tact?"

"What is tact?"

The human stood, face frozen blankly on a neutral expression and held up a finger, "Would you excuse me for a moment?" Krill watched in confused fascination as she walked to the head of the bed, grabbed the pillow and then walked into the back office. The door shut with a quiet click behind her. All around the room the other members of the medical staff had turned their heads in confused bemusement.

No one spoke.

And then the muffled noise came. Krill had never heard its like before. It was high and rising, but also muffled. It went on for a good five to ten seconds before petering out. All around the room the humans were either doing their best to ignore what had just happened or they were making a quieter version of that revving noise from earlier, teeth barred at each other.

A few of them look scared, others seemed to have found something funny.

A moment later the door opened and the human stepped out holding the pillow under one arm. She tossed it to one of the orderlies and then walked back over to where Krill was waiting. He looked her over, trying to figure out what could have been the genesis of that sound, but nothing about her indicated the ability to produce such a noise, so he could only assume it had been something else in the room.

She took her original position on the end of the bed, "Tact is when you watch what you say so as not to insult people, even if it is true."

"Why would it be insulting if it is true?' he retorted pointedly.

She sighed again deeply, cheeks expanding with the eruption of air, "It's insulting for a variety of reasons. Even if you are right, there are nicer ways of pointing those things out. Additionally, most people already know the things you are pointing out so there is no need to rub it in their faces simply to make them feel worse."

The doctor inflated his helium sack, floating a few inches off the ground, "Did I do something wrong?" He wondered. All around them the other humans had stopped what they were doing to listen in on the conversation. They weren't even trying to be discreet about it now and openly stared as the conversation progressed.

"Yes," she responded abruptly.

"Then tell me now. My species cannot read minds and I am unable to understand your social cues as I have not been instructed in them. My species is – not – social. We have no need to be."

"Ok, you want me to be straight with you, doctor. You're an arrogant asshole which ironically is the hallmark of a human surgeon." She took a deep breath. "You walk in here calling us barbarians, talking down to us like we are idiot children that don't understand what they are doing and maybe we aren't as smart as you, oh great one, but I don't think I need to remind you that you are on an alien ship surrounded by an alien species, all alone with no reinforcements and no way out." She leaned forward towering over him menacingly, "So I am going to do a favor and tell you now that you will not last five minutes with a group of humans without learning our rules. The captain may tolerate your antics, in fact he may even find it amusing, but I know for a fact there are people out there who would no sooner kick your ass for a lesser insult."

Krill blinked and floated back a little in nervous surprise. He honestly hadn't meant to bother the human. He was simply stating facts and never assumed that they would be taken issue with. He was beginning to learn that a social society made things vastly more complicated than he would have anticipated. He glanced around the room to gage the reaction of the other humans. A few of them were bobbing their heads while others just looked on in what he could only assume was amusement. He was reminded as he looked at them encircling him from all sides, that they were not simple aliens.

They were hunters.

Killers.

And they did it in packs. Everything about them was designed for social interaction. The way they thought, the way they spoke, how their language functioned, even their bodies functioned to the furtherment of sociability.

He was in more danger than he originally anticipated and would have to work hard to not infuriate or provoke the humans. He realized then that he would have to prove himself indispensable.

But for some reason that didn't stop him from asking his next question, "You keep calling me that? What do you mean?"

"Which part, arrogant?"

"No, that other one."

"An asshole?" Her arms dropped from their crossed position and her body relaxed. It was as if the anger had been entirely drained from her and replaced. Whatever he had done, it had worked and she no longer seemed intent on hurting him.

He would have to pay more attention to how he was doing that. It might be useful in the future to know how diffuse a human properly.

"What? Do you not understand that word? Seems like something that would translate relatively well?"

"I have recently been studying human anatomy and have even memorized the vernacular, but I want to know why you are using it in such a manner? It seems rather strange. You used it as an insult, I am quite sure. Do you often use anatomical parts as an insult?"

There was a pause around the room as the humans looked at each other..... "Um, actually yeah."

A woman sitting in the back corner began counting on the fingers of one hand with a frown of concentration on her face. "Hmm... yeah. All anatomical insults are genital in nature, if you look at it."

"Incorrect," one of the humans called out, "you can call someone a boob."

That sparked a debate that Krill had not intended on being part of.

"Technically it is."

"Technically it isn't"

"Physically it isn't but society has conditioned us to consider that it is, which I argue makes it counts," someone from the back of the room retorted, which only escalated the conversation until Krill, could barely understand what anyone was saying, just catching snippets here and there.

"I am sure there are SOME insults using other body parts, there has to be."

"Yeah when was the last time you called someone a crusty elbow or a lobe. You see it just doesn't work."

"Well maybe now I'll start calling people wenis and wagina."

"Good luck getting it to catch on, besides those are only joke words."

"Challenge accepted."

"And who are you going to get to help you with that?"

"Bet the captain would love to help me."

Krill scooted further back in the room finding himself standing next to a medical waste bin on one side and a pile of towels on the other, expecting this to turn into some sort of brawl between the humans for dominance of their opinions or something. However, that didn't happen and he was beginning to question his own assumptions.

It seemed that no matter how many times the humans physically threatened each other, they never actually ended up fighting and that seemed particularly strange, considering how much time they spent squared off against each other or using defensive posturing.

"HEY!" A voice rose through the din, battering the other humans into silence, "That's enough. Sit down, shut up and get back to work."

A quiet muttering enveloped the room, but everyone did as they were told, returning to their places, still quietly arguing with each other when they thought the lead human couldn't hear them. However, she clearly could hear them and glowered across the room towards them with her dark eyes. Krill watched in quiet fascination as the humans shifted uncomfortably, looking back over their shoulders before quickly clamming up and going about their business, as if they had known that she was staring at them. Though how that could be possible.... there was no indicator for them to have known.

Eventually the PA turned to look at him, "Now that we have dealt with THAT tangent, I suppose I should ask you what else you want to know so that you may perform your job. I am-" sigh, "after all, your teacher for the time being."

Krill looked around the room at the bright white walls, the long line of beds, and other alien contraptions that were, only now, beginning to make sense in context. Yet he was still having trouble deciphering some of the equipment or why such a layout.

"Returning to our earlier conversation then. Your species has two biological sexes, and in that case, I only have a biological map for one and to properly perform as your new physician I will need a biological map of the other."

There was a long pause and then the human let out a long drawn-out sigh, "I suppose I should have seen that coming."

"I already have a complete biological map of your captain, so that takes care of the male side."

"Ok, number one that is sort of creepy and number two, using a monopod cyclops as your standard for the average male human is a bad decision because I hate to tell you doc, but if there is one fact I know about the captain, average isn't one of them."

Krill waved off the comment and looked at the human expectantly, "Well?"

She sighed and with a bark, ordered the humans on the other side of the room to continue with their work before pulling a curtain closed around them to give them privacy, muttering under her breath. Apparently she had chosen to use herself as the average though she didn't appear particularly pleased about it. Krill filed away the fact that privacy was extremely important to the humans. As far as he knew, there were no other species who put such stock in the use of clothing. Of course the Rundi and the Tesraki both wore items of clothing on occasion to denote status or wealth, but were generally unclothed. The Vrul had never even considered the practice, but then again, they also had nothing to hide.

Humans, well as far as he knew, wore clothing and looking at the characteristics of the garments he found the tell-tale hint of machinery in their production. This seemed to indicate that human clothing was mass produced and extremely important in their culture, which was another fact he was going to have to add to his list and, perhaps, do a little research on.

Rita looked him in the eye, "Good thing, for you, I am wearing my work out clothes under my scrubs. You will only get a cursory introduction regarding the female physique. I have extensive holograms and computer files which I will push to your quarters for you to study at your convenience."

Upon cursory examination of the human, in addition to an in depth questioning, he learned that the anatomical comparison to the male was both parts confusing and almost pointless. When it came to height and weight it seemed as if the average male weighed more than the average female, though those numbers overlapped enough that if you took a human randomly from the population, knowing nothing but their weight, you would not be able to guess which sex they belonged to. It was the same with height, the human females trended shorter than the males, but if you were to just grab one from the population you would not have been able to tell who was who.

Generally speaking, they had the same hair patterns, though slightly less thick on the female and mostly absent from the lower face. Of course, the original male had been lacking facial hair originally, but it had begun to sprout rather quickly. This implied that some male humans removed the hair but the females generally could not grow it. It was rather intriguing, meaning that male humans had a "mane" perhaps? He must research proper terminology for human features. Why they would choose to remove it was another confusing puzzle that he was not able to answer at this particular moment.

The brain structure was so similar it would not have been possible to tell the difference from the outside, implying that the mental processing of the two was generally the same. Was one more intelligent than the other and if not, or so was it due to genetics or conditioning, which he had a feeling had a great impact on humans considering how emotional they all were?

Of course there were a few small differences in the skeletal structure, mainly in the pelvis, wider hips as compared to the male skeleton.

However, the thing that disturbed him and had always disturbed him about species that had more than one biological sex was the difference in immediate biology. The female had an extra organ on the interior, in which he was horrified to learn, small humans were grown and then brought to term.

The gestation period was nine months long and a viable human was delivered from the body; live with no shell, no protective carapace and at an average of five to seven pounds (a human weight measurement). The male pelvis would not accommodate the offspring passing through therefore the female or producer had wider hips. Additional differences included two layers of fat below the skin concentrated in the chest, hips and the butt, explained to him as a storage unit that would allow her to carry an offspring even if resources were minimal.

This extra storage also produced sustenance for the newborn offspring, an ability that was not something they could just turn on and off, but was hormonally activated. Speaking of hormones, the concentration of specific types within the body generally caused the male to grow bigger and heavier and led to minimal, but noticeable divergence in physical aggression. It was strange to see how different, but how ultimately similar the two were. Every difference between the two human genders had everything to do with the balance of hormones in the body. Nothing was original and everything was taken from the exact same blueprint but bombarded with different types of hormones. In fact, he would also have placed aggression in the category of height or weight, being that the males were only generally more aggressive, but if you picked one out of the population, you couldn't be entirely sure who you were going to get. For instance, on a scale of aggression he would have placed the PA higher than the captain. If he was to guess which one of them was likely to eat him unprovoked he would have picked her.

Besides, he was relatively certain he could just divert the attention of the captain long enough to get away. Through interaction with the captain, Krill was not convinced of the Captain's intelligence. Emotions had always struck him as the hallmark of species that was not incredibly intelligent.

Humans were horrifying, both the males and the females were more powerful than he but true fear for Krill lay in their unpredictability, as he was having a hard time understanding their culture and expressions.

With that in mind, Krill stowed his biological map, fully intent on examining it in greater detail at a later time, and the two of them exited back into the infirmary where the rest of the crew had gone back to work. A human was sitting at the edge of one of the beds while someone flashed light in each of his eyes. Krill noticed a translucent liquid leaking down the cheek of the patient. It originated from the left eye.

The medical orderly shut off the light.

"Yeah." the chemicals irritated your eye but there does not appear to be any damage. We will irrigate the eye and that will make it feel better." The human nodded before slipping down from the edge of the bed then walking toward a basin at one end of the room.

The PA walked Krill back towards the front of the room, "First things first, we have to talk about charting and intake. Every accident on the ship has to be documented for treatment and review, statistical purposes, and insurance." She pulled a white clipboard from the wall, "First thing we do is scan the ID chip in their arm that will give us medical history: age, allergies, prior medical conditions, previous procedures, prescriptions, that sort of thing. Once that is done, we are going to come down here and ask a few questions about their issue including symptoms. At this point a physical exam is performed to establish the problem. Based on the information you gather, we can go ahead and order tests if necessary. Following that you-"

"Hey, guys, hate to interrupt but, do you have a minute?"

With a sigh of exasperation, the PA spun in a circle towards the door, "Seriously, you don't have to check in every five minutes. I know how to do my job. I get it you're excited that there is an alien on board and you just can't contain yourself but PLEASE give me time to do my job."

The captain, poking his head through the doorway waited politely for her to finish, a relaxed smile on his face, "You know that was probably a good guess based on my prior history but I'm not actually here for that."

The PA paused in the middle of articulating a response, "Oh...?"

He stepped into the room withdrawing a hand from behind his back and held it up to the light, "I was wondering if I could borrow a band aid."

Krill buzzed in surprise, the human's hand had a line of red bodily fluid dripping down one of the fingers, over the palm of his hand, around his wrist and down his forearm.

She sighed, grabbed him by his good arm and dragged him to come sit down, "What the hell did you do this time?"

He waved his injured hand, "Not important." Then he turned to look at Krill, "By the way, how is your first day going?"

Krill stared at the bleeding hand and then back to the man who was barely reacting as his vital juices were spilling down his arm. Krill had seen the captain do that at least twice since they had met. "Your species is an abomination."

Instead of reacting like Krill had insulted him, the human burst into fits of laughter, "Never has truer words been spoken."

The PA grunted in annoyance as she grabbed the captain's hand. She began cleaning the wound with some kind of chemical wipe which grew red as the blood was washed away.

"Would you stop that?"

"Stop what?"

"Encouraging his poor behavior. Your doctor is never going to learn how to act properly around humans if you just let him get away with being rude."

The captain took the chemical wipe from her hand and finished cleaning the blood off, "Look Rita, it's the guy's first day. Let him relax and sink in before we culture shock him. Besides, who said that it was him who had to conform to us. Wouldn't kill the crew to learn how to interact with species that aren't human in a fashion that suits them more than it does us."

"While I agree with some of that. I have to remind you that he chose to come here of his own free will. The entire crew is human and he is going to have to deal with humans who AREN'T as hospitable as you. I am just trying to help him behave in a way that is not going to get his ass kicked."

The captain balled up the wipe and underhand tossed it into the biohazard bin a foot away.

The PA glowered at his hand, "Really, you came to me for this." The doctor moved a little closer, surprised to find a tiny cut on the side of the human's hand.

"I asked for a band aid not a tourniquet," he quipped back. "Back to my earlier point though. We are going to be hospitable, nice, civilized and teach him a few things. As of right now the Galactic Assembly thinks we are nice and I would like to keep it that way."

"You just want a reason to hang out with aliens. That has always been your excuse and that always will be your excuse," she grumbled, rummaging around in a side drawer.

"Yes, we all know that I think aliens are awesome, but we should also make a point to foster a GOOD RELATIONSHIP with aliens. Everyone wins. It's a big universe out there and we are new to it so we need to learn, form friendships and make alliances."

She came back a second later and thrust a thin strip at him, which he managed to miss as it slipped through his fingers. "If you liked aliens anymore, I would suspect that you had a fetish for them."

He bent down trying to find the little package, "Ok, now that's just mean." He picked up the thin strip, peeling it open with surprising delicacy despite his large hands. Krill noticed the remarkably complex physical structure below the skin of his hands. "I promise, I do not have an alien fetish, but imagine believing aliens were real for your entire life and everyone constantly told you you were wrong to the point you were being teased and bullied because you were the weird UFO kid and then imagine that you learn you were right all along. So forgive me for being smug and acting like a wide-eyed eight year old."

She eyed him as he finished fixing his hand, "UFOs still aren't real."

"Well, I had to be wrong about something otherwise it wouldn't be fair to the rest of you normal people, anyways it just makes me more convinced that UFOs were really high tech cloaking drones that the government was using to spy on people."

"You're kidding, right?"

"Yeah, I'm just messing with you." Krill watched her flash the sclera of her eyes at him once more which did nothing against his impenetrable grin.

The captain stood to leave and then suddenly turned to Krill, "I just remembered. What kind of accommodations do you need? A private room, do you even need a room? I am not entirely sure about how personal space works on your planet."

Krill paused to think about the question, "I do not require personal space, though I enjoy the privacy of an office space from time to time to conduct my studies in a proper environment."

The human nodded, "Alright, that sounds fair. I'll have some of the Marines clear out one of the rooms in the administrative wing, goodness knows they need something to do before they break the ship or start some sort of riot." Krill didn't know what a Marine was, but this entire thing was making him very concerned and it gave him pause to wonder why the human did not seem more bothered by the words that were coming out of his mouth, which seemed pretty serious to Krill.

"This is assuming that you don't do the same thing first," The PA mused, tapping her foot against the whitewashed floor.

"Yeah, you're probably right."

"Speaking of which," she went on suspiciously, "How did the 'captaining' go?"

The expression he gave her was one Krill had not yet seen, a close mouthed smile with the lips pressed tight together, "Oh it went great, I did all the captainy things you can think of. How did everything here go?"

"I got probed by aliens," she said stone faced.

"Oh you too, join the club ... twice."

"Difference is you probably enjoyed it," she muttered.

"That is very hurtful and you should apologize for being mean to me," his body posture was not synching up with his words and Krill wasn't entirely sure which one to believe. The captain didn't seem upset.

She didn't bother answering him that time, turning her back and walking across the room. Krill watched as she raised one of her hands over her shoulder and made a strange gesture with her five digits. The captain simply laughed.

It was at that moment a few other members of the med team chose to approach him.

"Captain?" The one-eyed human turned in a quick circle.

"Yes?"

"I wanted your opinion on a subject of great importance," all around the room the other humans were rolling their eyes and shaking their heads, though they were also smiling.

That only seemed to interest the captain who leaned against the wall, "Oh, do tell. I am anxious to hear about things of great importance."

"Well, you missed our discussion about human insults. How every time you use a body part to describe someone it is always one of the lewd ones."

The captain tapped in chin head tilted thoughtfully to the side, "Mmmm, you can call someone a boob."

"It was determined that based on social conditioning that that one counts, my point is I threatened to start calling people by other names to break this cycle and they said I would never get it to catch on."

Krill simply stared on in consideration as the human nodded his head like this was a serious issue, though there was something behind his eyes...something strange, like a shimmer or a sparkle, something that made Krill feel like the captain wasn't actually being serious. How he could tell that or why he would assume that, he had no idea.

"I see, what were you thinking?"

"Wasn't entirely sure yet."

"Hmm, agreed. I'll have to think about it. Though strangely enough you can insult PLACES with non-lewd body parts like calling someplace an armpit."

This was the serious discussion? Is this the kind of conversation Krill would expect aboard the ship? Krill was expecting to increase his knowledge during his foray on the human ship but he could already feel his four cortical hemispheres shrinking with such a lack of intellect and wisdom he had encountered thus far.

And not for the first time, he wondered what he had gotten himself into.


	21. Chapter 21

The human body grows redundant organs. For instance, if you were to remove one human kidney, you would find there to be no adverse side effects to the human barring infection or complication from the procedure itself. 

WARNING: Similar procedures should not be attempted on any nonhuman subjects. 

-

The land was washed with grey; great flakes of ash descending from the sky like the lazy drifting of snowflakes, all to coat the ground in great heaps of dark powder. The once bright and colorful landscape was now a wasteland of dull greyness, a purgatory where color and light went to die. Overhead the sky was blotted out by great billowing clouds of volcanic ash, the genesis of their hellish waste casting the sun into darkness and plunging the land into bitter cold.

The ambient light of their powerful star was able to cut through the thick covering giving them a midnight luminescence to the dark landscape, a darkness that could last months if they were unlucky.

Adding faintly to the eerie luminance was the fiery hellish red which tinged the underside of the clouds and trickled in thick, undulating strings down the sides of the remote, hunching mountains.

A distant, low rumble echoed across the fertile valley giving the air a constant sort of vibration as maddening as it was soothing. Intermittently this rumbling would grow louder, and the distant fiery light would flare before dying down once again. In a way it was almost as if Anum was breathing, awoken after many long months of slumber.

The movement of footsteps was almost undetectable across the thick coating of ash and dormant moss underneath. The sparse scattering of Coiltrees had retracted their limbs inwards into spirals. Little white petals littered the ash about their bases and overripe rotting fruit fermented on their curled branches.

In this dull, ashen darkness, the Drev village was a small beacon of light, luminance surrounded the perimeter with interwoven points of light; spirit orbs, bright blue, cool and comforting atop three-meter poles jammed into the earth. A figure armored and cloaked stepped from the wasteland to be bathed in the vigilant blue light. The perimeter guards barely noticed his presence as he passed between them and into the village, cutting by dark houses cold and unoccupied.

He continued in the same manner as he passed through the low hunching houses. Voices, just barely audible over the distant rumbling, drifted from a few dwellings hinting at emptiness that war caused.

The dark silhouette cut right along another line of houses and up to the base of the cathedral, where it was swiftly noticed by a pair of guards stationed at the grand, sweeping base of the cathedral stairs. They stepped forward as the figure approached, crossing their steel-shafted spears in front of his chest and leaning in to peer under the hood aided by nothing but the dim, glowing light that thrummed from their spear tips.

“General.”

With the threat proven groundless, the spears uncrossed with the soft slither of steel over steel and the two Drev stepped slowly back into position.

“My daughter, have you seen her?” The cloaked figure asked, his voice deep but muffled in the ashy silence.

The guard on the left nodded towards a door hidden just below the stairs, looking as if it led below the cathedral foundation. The Drev general bowed his head and crossed over to the door, leaving long footprints behind him in the ashfall, the still silent soldiers returning to their dark vigil.

The door slid open with a quiet hiss and he stepped inside with the muffled rattle of armor and the swishing of a cloak. Once inside, the door silently shut behind him, the darkness chased away by an orb of bright blue light positioned just next to the door. He lifted his head and threw the hood back from his face shedding ash in the entryway as he shook his cloak onto the floor.

The metal of his armor echoed down the stairwell with a metallic rattle. He undid the clasp about his neck and threw the cloak over one of his lower arms, ducking below the shallow ceiling and stepping onto the stairs. Blue light flickered from below, bringing with it the rumbling of machinery, the metallic hiss of metal over metal, and the sparking crackle of electricity.

The rumbling only grew heavier as he descended the stairs. Somewhere a hydraulic pump hissed, it’s attached monitor beeping softly. He stepped onto the stone floor and was suddenly immersed in a different world. Metal clattered and steam hissed around him as quiet bodies murmured and breathed to one another. Drev wearing strange fibrous armor stepped past him carrying molten items with long-iron tongs. He stepped to the side as one of these masked Drev passed by pushing an armature of half-finished armor across the floor, hooking it up to a crane which lifted with a slow hum.

He sidestepped another hurrying figure, ducked under a pipe and walked into an aisle lined with grease stained-metal tables, many of which were occupied by a dirty grease covered Drev worker bathed in shadow, illuminated only by the sparkling white light of their soldering tools and the dim glow above provided by the cathedrals limited supply of soul orbs.

In this contrast of near darkness and too bright light, their faces and colors were impossible to distinguish, transforming them into the simple horror of strangers, robotic and soulless, toiling away at their enteral work without so much as an original thought. The eerie way the dim blue light glittered off their hunched forms made him shiver.

None looked up as he passed, their eyes fixed through goggles and angled towards their work. His footsteps were nearly silent as he stepped across the floor, making his way deeper into the workshop and fading further into the deepening shadows.

To him it seemed as if the room went on forever, forcing him to find his way through a maze of tight corridors and alleys between stacks of unfinished machinery and armor. Racks and racks of weapons and spears waited to have their edges honed. Most were spears, but some were swords. Some were rudimentary as they were in the beginning stages while others revealed the complicated network of fibers and delicate metal elements hinting at untold technology and battlefield advantage. The work they did here was kept secret and safe, hidden from traditional zealots who frowned on tampering with the spirit’s rules of engagement.

The Drev were a species driven primarily by tradition and obligation. Their dwellings were rudimentary, their armor was simple and their weapons were kept within the bounds of what was deemed honorable. Of course this did not mean they didn’t innovate. They knew much about a great deal of technology. They weren’t unaware of the use of projectile weapons, long distance transport, flight, energy fields or even robotics, they valued tradition in war and in their daily life.

What advancements they DID make were a marriage of tradition and technology in the areas that governed war or finding food. Energy shields were developed and constructed for dealing with volcanic heat. Flight was primarily utilized for weather-gathering instruments to determine the best routes for advancement and attack and the best places for battle. If not that, then cameras aboard were used to monitor unpredictable lava flow.

There were other clans across the globe with different ideas and interests who put more stock in the use of science and technology, but with their clan’s power and might in war and continued claim on the fertile belt, their clan remained more rudimentary and traditional. Their technology was kept apart from daily life, hidden away, and used only in emergencies. Innovation was done sparingly and in near secrecy and was mostly, if not always, based on the practices of war, such was the need for secrecy here under the citadel.

As a general rule, the Drev had never advanced in the field of medical science, and their ideas towards medicine and doctors were simple.

If you were injured, you either healed or you died.

If you got sick, you either healed or you died.

If you were contagious, you were quarantined until you either healed or you died.

If you healed poorly it was your obligation to make sure you died so as not to become a burden to the clan. Due to this history, the Drev population had never experienced the explosion demonstrated by human populations across earth. Their villages remained small and were controlled by genetics and survival of the fittest. They had no need for large scale farming operations and so had never domesticated plants or animals. It was as tradition and the gods dictated.

This fundamental truth of Drev culture was on clear display in the dark and foreboding workshop below the cathedral foundation. No medical devices were made here. If it wasn’t a weapon or armor, it probably had to do with something related to weapons or armor and in certain cases long distance communications or visuals, all of which were utilized to ensure victory in battle. It was with this intent that the Drev workers plowed on with single minded determination in the darkness under the color-draining lights with the world rattling around them in the unnatural way that machinery had.

The general turned another corner still in contemplation, suddenly wondering if he had gotten himself lost in the maze of work benches and half-finished suits of armor. Everything down here felt unnatural and it wouldn't have surprised him if he managed to lose his way. At some point, the darkness around him grew more intense so the little light there was only served to wash the world of even more color making the view that much more disorienting. Metal and stone was cold under his feet. Racks and racks of armaments stretched back into the palpable darkness, much of it dangling half finished on hooks from the ceiling, old models that would likely never see battle but be broken down and reused.

The work benches began to dwindle, growing ever more decrepit the further he went while the electric buzz of sparks on metal faded into the general background of unnatural mechanized chaos. It was against this background, detached and somewhat despondent that he heard it; the short rattling buzz hidden well back in the darkness. He followed the sound, and eventually a stuttering blue light which cast sparks into the air and framed a dark silhouette and the low-hanging stone was barely visible.

He came around one last row of shelves bathing himself in that stuttering blue light, his footsteps drowned out by the snapping crackle of electricity. A small figure was hunkered down on an overturned bucket in the opening between two crowded shelves all pressed snugly together against the back wall.

On its lap, the figure balanced the long shaft of a spear. Its exterior had been cracked open via a delicate metal panel revealing its insides, allowing the current engineer complete access to the wiring and circuits that had, no doubt, been expertly laid within the metal. Blue sparks continued to leap up from the work on the shaft, as with precise and delicate coordination the engineer worked to give the weapon life.

Besides the sparks, the scene was lit by a single dim spirit orb which was arguably useless in the consuming darkness.

“Sunny,” Lumnus called between bouts of sparks.

“Sunny!”

He had to call her name twice more before she finally flinched and lifted her head to face him. He couldn’t see her particularly well in the dimness as her eyes were obscured by a protective shielding. Upon seeing him she quickly pulled the shield from her face and laid it on the crowded shelf beside her.

“Father!” she exclaimed. “What are you doing here?”

He ignored the question at first, looking around at her little workspace with it’s overturned bucket, dim light, cramped space and open tray of old-rusty tools which she kept at her feet.

“Why aren’t you up working with the others?” he wondered.

She glanced down at the weapon, rolling it absently up and down against her thighs. “Oh, I like it back here... easier to focus.”

He glanced back down the aisle from which he had come and towards the sound of the other workers, then again at his daughter where she sat hunched and cramped on the base of an overturned bucket. He had his suspicions, but he didn’t question Sunny, knowing she would never admit to any allegations regarding treatment from the others.

“What are you working on?’ he asked, walking over to kneel next to her.

Even kneeling he still towered over her by a good foot or two.

To his pleasure, he watched as excitement blossomed over the young Drev's face as she lifted the spear to eye level. “It’s my new weapon father, you see?” She closed the little hatch on the side and stood, stepping into the open aisle before brandishing the weapon with a sharp flick of her wrist.

She was, not surprisingly, very graceful, a trait that she had inherited from her mother.

The thought made his heart ache.

She spun the shaft of the spear in a tight controlled circle, thrust it outward and keyed some sort of trigger with one of her fingers. There was a sharp snap and one end of the spear shot forward clicking into place, now a foot longer at one end than it had been before. She spun the spear again doing the same to the other end. “See,” she demanded in excitement, “to make my reach longer during combat.”

Lumnus lowered his head over his throat in a miniscule show of anger, “I thought they had you developing new weapons for the infantry.”

Sunny paused, lowering the spear to her side slowly, “I ...they said they…didn’t need me on the project anymore. They said I was free to work on my own projects.” She did her very best to seem excited but the aching in his chest only grew worse. She held the spear out to him and he felt, rather than saw, the desperation in her face, “What do you think? Pretty good…isn’t it?”

He stood, reaching out to take the weapon in his two upper hands.

He held it between the two, then balanced it at the center of the shaft. He rotated it in the air a couple of times before spinning it between his hands. Following her demonstration earlier, he pressed the button, again feeling a vibration through the metal as the spear locked into place. He thrust with one end and then the other before locking the other end back. Finally satisfied, he held the weapon in both hands looking down at his daughter who stared up at him with nervous golden eyes. Eyes just like that of her mother.

“This is very good work Sunny,” and he wasn’t lying. He didn’t believe in giving praise where praise was not due. While constant ridicule did her no good, neither did constant praise especially if it was unwarranted or undeserved, “Though it will be a difficult weapon to wield if you don’t remember to lock both points at the same time. The center of balance becomes heavily thrown off and I would suggest tightening the two sliding segments. I felt a bit of a rattle on the rotation.”

She nodded her head but looked relieved, “Thank you father, with one point out the weight would naturally shift towards the front giving me more heft during a thrust. I wouldn’t use it for sweeping maneuvers of course.”

Lumnus hummed with pleasure for her, though it hurt him to watch.

He constantly watched as day after day, week after week, she doggedly and single-mindedly drove herself with all the work she put into training and learning the arts of combat. He was proud as he watched her improve but disheartened to always witness her being defeated time after time after time when it really mattered. He knew his daughter and he knew she worked harder and was more dedicated than any other member of the clan, no argument. He knew she was strong and skilled and had more weapons expertise than anyone her age, and yet whether out of sheer dumb luck, brute force, or even a conspiracy of the universe she always ended up behind, somehow and in some way.

When fighting couldn’t make her any better, he was then forced to watch as she struggled to develop technology that would outstrip her weaknesses, this spear being the latest in a long list of fruitless inventions and add-ons. Perhaps this time it would work.

“How confident are you in this weapon?”

She looked, eyes trailing over the simple but elegant line of the metal. He knew his daughter and even though she was desperate she wasn’t stupid.

“More than I have ever been, father.”

“Good, then my presence is not poorly timed.” He adjusted his cloak over one of his arms, “You will come on patrol with me today. With the bulk of our armies gone to war, I sense an uneasiness in the air.”

“Do you think the eastern clans will try and take the cathedral?” Sunny wondered, nervously fidgeting with her spear.

“I believe there is a very high likelihood that they might try something.” He motioned her to follow after him and together they made their way through the maze of crowded benches and shelves forced to raise their voices over the sound of machinery and sparks.

“Do you have a set of armor yet?” he wondered.

There was a pause, “Not yet father…they are all too big.”

Lumnus marched quickly through the shelves and aisles making it to the base of the stairs in a shorter amount of time than it had taken him to cross originally. Once there, he pulled his cloak over his shoulders clasping it about his throat as he adjusted the spear in his grip. “It is time to accept your diminutive size, Sunny. Your nineteenth dark season has come and gone, so you shouldn’t expect much more height in the next year. Retrieve some armor from the Drevling’s training gallery and meet me at the edge of the village for patrol.”

She wilted slightly in her place, but nodded.

“Well, be quick about you. We don’t have all dark season.”

That galvanized her into movement and she leapt to attention, racing up the stairs and out the door and into the ashfall, leaving a trail of footprints behind her as she vanished into the village.

-

The sky had only grown darker by the time Sunny made her way to the edge of the village. The armor upon her back was simple, crude, and ugly in her opinion, but there was no denying that it was just as functional as any of the armor she would have used otherwise. When the Drev trained, they trained with and in the same equipment that would be present during a battle.

Still, her dull silver armor of crude construction and tattered grey cloak made her feel small and inconsequential as she stepped up next to her father; tall, commanding and powerful in his glittering horned armor of exquisite craftsmanship and his fluttering golden cloak, though it was stained with ash.

Lumnus was more than two feet taller than her, standing at just over nine feet compared to her measly 6.5, his stature only added to by the towering twisted horns that rose from the apex of his helmet. With him were at least fifty soldiers split into fighting pairs as was common. Looking over her shoulder, Sunny noted that the vast majority of them looked more than a little bored, some of them even annoyed. They were probably still smarting from being left behind as their friends and family went to war, though complaining would change nothing. Obviously, someone would have to stay back to protect the village, the Drevlings and the cathedral.

In fact, the dark season was the most dangerous time for the Drev attacks as they were difficult to spot through the thick ashfall. Not only that, but the very same phenomenon helped to cover the sound of an approaching army, dampening the sound of footsteps and armor over stone. The eastern clans, not many miles towards the rising sun, were of great concern to her father. They were relatively isolated, situated along the banks of the largest inland sea. For this reason, they didn’t often experience attacks on their own village, so they focused on offense and staging attacks on her home and its coveted position in the fertile valley. If it weren't for all the resources the eastern clans recovered from the inland sea, then they may have attempted a full-scale invasion years ago. At any event, attack was still a distinct possibility and not one that her father would easily brush off.

As for her father, he surveyed the dark landscape with a critical eye. He was alone, as usual. You wouldn’t have thought so by looking at him, but this behavior was not normal for a Drev. Once a pair was mated, it was expected that they fight together as a battle pair, but for as long as Sunny could remember she had never seen her mother and father fight together. She had also never seen her father go off to war or her mother stay home to protect the village. If it weren’t for his unmatched skill in rebuffing attacks on their village, he might have been branded as a coward years ago and cast into the fires. Even so, the rumors about him were rampant and her existence did not help her father. An existence, she was sure had something to do with her parent’s strange behavior.

She stopped in the ash just a few feet behind her father, armor clinking in the quiet of the ashen valley. She didn’t turn around to look at the other soldiers, sure they would be looking at her in her stupid child’s armor, whispering behind her back as they always did.

“Come here Sunny,” he motioned her forward with one of his lower arms and she obeyed.

He pointed out to the horizon and the glowing of the distant volcanoes, “You see that?”

She squinted her eyes against the falling ash, “A lava flare?” she guessed.

He nodded his large regal head, “and do you know what that means?

She shifted nervously on her feet, “Cinderwind?”

A sharp breeze picked up around them, bringing with it hot, dry heat from the volcano. Ash stirred and churned around their feet, breaking up into smaller and smaller particles as it was disturbed. The land before them grew hazy and indistinct, “Visibility is significantly reduced and if we aren’t vigilant and ready, a large force can use that as cover to sneak past our guards and into the village.”

Another gust of wind blew about their legs, kicking up more ash into the air. Not distantly to their right, Sunny watched one of the coiltree slowly begin to hunch in on itself against the wind, shedding ash from it’s trunk, letting it drop towards the ground. Occasionally little white spores would join the slowly strengthening gusts, but their presence saw a sharp decline as the amount of ash in the air increased.

Despite the hot winds from the volcanoes, the day was still rather cold.

Her father passed his spear to another hand and turned towards his soldiers, “I want patrol groups of ten, thermal at the front. That makes five groups. Start from the five points of the village, head out far and then circle inwards - that way our patrols overlap. Finish back at the village and repeat, am I understood?”

The Drev warriors raised their spears in salute, breaking into teams of ten organized by pairs of two and then marched silently towards the village, vanishing into billows of agitated ash.

Together Sunny and her father lowered the visors of their helmets simultaneously, blocking the ash from their mouths and noses, though she could still feel the buildup on her skin and armor dulling the bright blue of her carapace and the gold of her father’s.

“We join the eastern rotation,” Lumnus ordered. Sunny nodded and moved towards the back of the group where she was always placed, but Lumnus grabbed her by the arm. “No Sunny, not today. Today we fight together.” She lifted her head to look up at him surprised, not sure if she should be pleased or embarrassed. A part of her wanted to be embarrassed for her father showing her so much blatant pity, but another part of her, the stronger part, couldn't resist the allure of fighting at the front, of someone believing in her enough for once even to allow her to pretend.

It was a good thing the wind had kicked up with the roaring of the volcanoes so she couldn't hear the muttering behind their backs. Of course, Drev pairs were common outside of mated pairs, that’s how it had to work, especially for young Drev, but the fact that Lumnus, who always fought alone, was now allowing her forward to fight with him showed what others were sure to see as nepotism.

But as Lumnus saw it, if they were going to show her constant disfavor, then he was going to have to make up for it somehow. Besides, he stood by what he had said since she was born. He believed in her, she just needed time to prove herself and someone who would give her the chance to do so.

Unlike Sunny, he didn’t worry about what anyone would think about his decision and led their group of ten and his daughter off towards the eastern end of the village. They found the guard marking the eastern end and began there, stringing out in a staggered formation with Lumnus and Sunny towards the front.

Together they braved the storm, plunging face first into a swirl of ash which blasted against their skin, coating their bodies in a layer of filth. Her father’s cape, once gold, was no more than a murky brown-grey at the behest of the ash. The world around them was deadened and shadowed by the grime, making it hard to view anything under the obscuring layer of debris.

An entire valley was laid out before them and may have contained thousands of advancing troops for all they knew, but their vision was more than obscured.

She held up one hand and used her lower to wipe some of the grime from the eyewear of her helmet. Moments after cleaning them off they were grimy again, giving everything a shadowy grey quality, nothing more than movement and shadow. Her cloak billowed and fluttered at her back, throwing the hood from her head and whipping the cape around her body.

With a quick jerk of her wrists she threw her arms to the side, breaking them away from the constricting coils of the cloak, she would be no use in battle if two of her arms were pinned. From then on she tried to keep the fabric at bay as it was tugged around her body.

Another cloud of rolling ash came over them, momentarily swallowing her father in darkness before he appeared again as a hunched shadow, head bent double against the wind and the ash. Time seemed to slow inside this spinning vortex of colorless nothing. There was no change in the visible light, no sight of their star or their moons to light the way, only a deep grey ambiance. The world felt so dark and dead without its color as an hour or two drew on into an eternity of discomfort as they faced their trek through the void.

Inside her chest, Sunny could feel the hammering of her one and a half hearts as it forced warmth to the surface of her freezing skin. The ground below them was an indistinct grey waste of nothingness occasionally broken up by isolated stalks of despondent plant matter peering through the mounds of ash, only to be blown over moments later and plunged back into darkness.

There would be both great advantages and disadvantages for any enemy trying to attack them at this time. The principal advantage being complete concealment. The watchful eyes that surrounded and protected the village would have no way of spotting them from a distance or even worse, up close. They could have an entire army at their doorstep before the guards could respond. Even roaming scouts like her father and his soldiers might not detect an army and any trail they left would be covered up upon their passing leaving no trace they had ever passed.

Of course, the same circumstances which afforded the enemy a pronounced advantage also left them at a distinct disadvantage. The low visibility hid the unknown terrain. If they guessed incorrectly, they could lead their army past their target without knowing or walk straight into a roaming patrol.

Thermal vision was their only ally here in the ashen wasteland and that was only useful up to a certain distance due to the interference of an abundance of ash. Even her father’s troops were essentially walking blindly into the storm, relying heavily on their maps and their markers to keep them on the right track.

Over and over again ash swirled around her in a tight spiral, sending particles rushing towards the sky to be caught up in the mass. She kept her head low while trying to focus on the terrain, which she could barely see past the swirling vortex. Hot wind blasted against her skin. Up ahead, her father began pulling to the left, starting them in on the first curve of their planned arc.

Distantly she heard the rumbling of thunder. She knew that sound, had known it since her childhood. It was volcanic lightning, whipped up by the ash, lava and the power of the storm around them. A thrill of anxious fear rolled through her and she lowered the tip of her spear ever so slightly, not like it would matter if the lightning did decide to strike.

Ahead, her father pulled to a stop, his cloak whipping in frantic loops behind his back. He turned his head to the side, the profile of his regal head bent low against the incoming wind. Lightning flashed in the distance lighting up the ash with an eerie dispelled luminescence, bright electric blue.

And it was there against that sudden flash of light that she saw it.

“FATHER!”

Lumnus turned in a sharp arc bringing his spear up in a flash of sparks. A gust of air tore past them, clotting out her view with an immense cloud of billowing greyness. Despite her face covering, she tasted an acrid bitterness on her tongue.

Lightning flashed again as she ran forward, her feet slipping on loose ash over stone and cracking over the rotted corpses of the overripe fire bulbs missed during the last harvest. Wet nectar spattered over her feet giving them a gory red cast.

Metal clattered somewhere in the confusion and Sunny ran forward her heart hammering, her brain struggling to keep up. The surreal void of the ash, and the swirling nature of the wind had her confused as to whether this was a dream or not. She had never seen battle before.

A dark silhouette appeared in front of her and instinct had her diving towards the ground just in time to feel the disturbance of air as something razor sharp cut over her head. In her haste, her feet slipped and she hit the ground hard rolling to the side as moss crackled under her armor. A gust ripped at her cloak, threatening to tug it in front of her face and obscure her vision. With one desperate hand, she ripped at the quick release and another powerful burst of air tore the article of clothing into the darkness. She rolled to her side trying to gain her feet and that was when the silver, leaf-blade of a spear slammed into the ground beside her head sending powerful vibrations through the ground and into her bones.

She rolled sharply to the side as the spear tip cracked into the ground once more. She landed on her back bringing the tip of her spear to bare just in time to deflect yet another blow, sending it bouncing off to the right. Sparks dispersed into the air, battered by the power of the wind. With her back foot she kicked at the leg of her assailant, nothing more than a towering black silhouette in the ash above.

The spear came down yet again, but she was prepared this time. Placing both her hands on her weapon like a quarterstaff, she sent the deadly point biting into the ground just to her left. Metal screamed against stone. With a flick of her lower left arm, she rotated her spear to the side, sending the right tip flying up towards her opponent. The enemy pulled away ever so slightly, but Sunny wasn’t done yet. With a sharp flick, the blade of her weapon extended forward catching the other warrior a glancing blow across the base of the throat.

With a yelp of pain barely heard over the howling wind, the injured Drev staggered back as Sunny lunged forward, thrusting her weight off the ground by way of the plated spearhead. Her opponent staggered back and then…was gone, vanishing in the blanket of ash. Sunny’s momentum and her target gone caused Sunny to stumble a few steps forward as the ground below her sloped in a sudden decline.

She pulled back with a yelp, terminating her forward motion by falling backwards, an action that may well have saved her life. Something slammed into her armored shoulder leaving her with pain shooting down her upper right arm. Another silhouette went tumbling past her, an enemy warrior carried by their own momentum down the rocky decline of the hill, swallowed quickly by the ash as if they had fallen into a dark lake of tar.

Sheer dumb luck willing, she had survived. She scrambled to her feet, slipping more than once against the ash. Despite her knowledge of this phenomena, she nearly lost her balance twice more before making it to her feet, charging through the darkness and ash towards where she had last seen her father.

With one forearm, she dashed at the lenses of her helmet, trying to pull away some of the grime which was doing it’s best to obscure her vision. Below she felt rock, unforgiving under her feet.

A serendipitous flash of blue lightning helped her find the way, and she charged over an incline. The wind was a powerful noise in her ears, but with it came the discordant clashing of metal on metal and voices screaming out in pain. Two figures rose up in her vision, sparks flew.

One had horns upon his helm.

Without thought, Sunny raced forward, watching as a third figure rose from the darkness behind one of the struggling figures.

She threw herself forward just in time to catch a horrifically powerful blow with the shaft of her weapon, a blow that had been meant for the figure now struggling behind her. She craned her neck back, staring up at the towering silhouette. The opponent pushed down and she strained against its strength, sliding backwards across the stone. Behind her someone cried out in pain.

“DUCK!”

Automatically, Sunny disengaged from her enemy and crouched towards the stone. Her rival slipped forward in surprise catching the scything tip of Lumnus’s spear in the face.

With a sharp thud, the figure fell into the ash in gruesome surprise.

“Sunny, are you alright!” her father called over the howling of the wind.

She turned her head to look at him nodding in somewhat dazed shock.

They didn’t have time to be relieved. Sunny watched the space behind her father darken. With a cry of fear and intense panic, Sunny lunged forward, spear striking just past her father, right between two of his right arms.

She felt rather than saw the head of her spear make contact. There was a sharp contact followed by a short sliding sensation. A distinct and audible pop quickly followed the exchange. Her father spun to the side and she lunged forward, driving her weapon deeper into the flesh of her opponent, pushing down, forcing the blade to cut.

Someone cried out in agony.

It was in the next moment that she found herself suspended over a fallen figure.

Through the wind and driving ash, she thought she saw a dull glimmer of purple. At her back, her father engaged another opponent. She had no time to dwell on what she had just done, instead wrenching the head of her weapon from the body and spinning it to assist her father. She didn’t make it all the way around before being accosted by two more figures from the side.

She caught the blow of one on her spear, but took the impact of another against her chest. Staggering to the side, she spun her spear upwards in a quick spiral, forcing one opponent back with a stagger as she disarmed it. She then cut back from right to left.

A slight tug at the tip of her weapon suggested that she hit something, though she could not have said what. At that moment, something grabbed her by an arm and in a show of immense power she was whipped through the air like a ragged length of moss. Darkness rose up in front of her and she frantically stabbed at it. Her attack was batted to the side with relative ease.

Behind her, her father sent an overhand blow towards the head of an opponent that decimated its armor and send it rattling to the ground, face first, feet following. This enemy did not return to its feet. He followed that blow by whipping the other end of his spear in one continuous motion. Lumnus’s strike was blocked, but clearly he had anticipated that response, using the angle of his contact and friction of metal against metal to stab straight into the neck of his opponent. He drew back, quickly grabbing his daughter by the arm and exchanging places with her for a second time.

Sunny cried out in pain as the tip of a blade cut a glancing blow across her upper arm. Warm blood erupted from the wound, clotted in the moment by falling ash.

Lumnus dispatched her opponent with a swift exchange of blows, stepping over the body while dragging Sunny with him, still in the thick of combat. She followed at his back, desperately fighting to hold her ground and protect her father’s back as he decimated their opponents.

It was all she could do to keep from dying, much less make any effectual strikes. Time after time she blocked, slid, and stumbled her way into survival, always reacting to the slight rushes of movement and the hulking approach of shadowy silhouettes. The crude drevling armor which she wore soaked up impact after impact to a greater extent than any Drevling suit of armor had ever taken. Her body ached horribly.

Just ahead of them a body fell, materializing from the ash and sliding across the grubby stone with a sickening clatter and crunch. The short horns on the helmet marked the figure as one of their own. Lumnus leaped forward over the fallen body tearing into the darkness with Sunny hard at his heels

Around them, the ash was becoming sporadic. The gusts were no longer steady and unforgiving, coming in waves rather than one continuous wall of confusion. The sky above them blanched and then darkened like the slow pulsing beat of a heart as the ash cleared and then clogged the sky. It was thanks to this singularity that Sunny caught their approach. Five figures converging from all sides.

“FATHER!”

It was the only warning she could give before the figures were upon her, charging from the ash and onto the stone. One hulking figure rolled from the vortex, spearless, instead wielding two single edged swords. She stumbled back in shock and fear as the two swords slashed towards her. In desperation she threw up her weapon, catching the two blades on the metal shaft of her spear, staggering back with the power of the blow. Sparks ignited and then were snuffed. She grunted as she pushed back. She could feel the power of her opponent, felt her arms buckling against its strength as sharp, honed points slowly cut towards her chest.

She was going to die.

That fact made her angry.

With a raw bellow; a powerful battle cry that reverberated through her chest and into her ugly mangled armor, she swiftly and automatically spun her spear to the left throwing her opponent’s swords to the side. Her mind either went numb or sharpened as she registered a blade whipping towards her head. She snapped the tip of her blade, blocking that strike too just before ducking under the second scything blade.

With a sharp rotation, she brought her spear around in a tight arc, feeling the vibrations through her bones and carapace as her strike was deflected. A sharp rush of movement was the only thing to alert her to the thrusting tip of the blade, allowing her only enough time to dodge to the side, but not quite fast enough as a burst of fire roared through her body. She screamed again, this time a mixture of pain and anger as she brought the flat of her spear shaft downwards, violently crashing onto her enemy’s fingers. A blade clattered to the ground spinning off to be enveloped by a mound of ash.

He may have gotten her, but that left him open for a counter strike. With another scream of anger, Sunny brought her spear up, sharply deflecting the next jab at her face. Half disarmed and completely open, Sunny could see her chance, yet knowing in that instant there was no way she was going to to be able to use her spear in time.

You’re small, go in low and take them around the legs.

Her opponent seemed just as surprised as she was when she dropped her spear and lunged for his legs. It didn’t take much to get lower than his center of gravity, she quickly crashed against his knees with all her strength, lifting and pushing backwards. She felt her feet fly up and her head tip forward as they both hit the ground, plowing up an explosion of ash that was whipped away by a gust of wind. Somewhere, a sword clattered to the ground.

Sunny reacted as quickly as she could, scrambling up the body of her opponent. Arms, eight of them clawed and wailed against each other. Sunny panted and cried out against the pain as the foe kicked and struggled through the ash. He tried to toss her off more than once, but she gripped onto his arms fighting back with desperation.

She was loosing.

One of her hands broke loose and she snatched at her only chance, plucking the dagger from its sheath on her armor before slamming it down in a plunging arc. A hand reached out to grab her, but missed as fingers skid clumsily over her ash-covered armor.

She felt the crunch, a wet sort of crack, followed by a thrumming gurgle. Her opponent spasmed under her and then went still. When the panic and ash faded from her eyes, she looked down to find her knife had been deflected, burying itself behind the breast plate in his lower neck sliding perfectly into the phnupernum, a non-esophageal respiratory opening in a Drev’s lower neck. Fluid had filled his lungs in an instant, drowning him in his own blood. She watched him choke into silence.

Hands finally falling limp, she fell back gasping and panting, swaying as her vision grew dark. Her body felt as if she was trying to push her way through frozen water, yet through that haze she was struck by a horrible vision. A spear crashing towards her face. She had no time to raise her hands or even scream knowing she was about to die.

A spear point sprouted from her attacker’s chest, shedding droplets of orange icor. The Drev looked down, hands extended wide to the side with an astonished, eyes wide expression. The spear clattered from her enemy’s hands and onto the stone, bouncing once, then twice with a rattling clang before rolling across the stone and into the moss.

Then, still sporting that expression of surprise, her assailant jerked forward and then back violently as the spear point was yanked from their chest. She swayed there eyes staring glassily at the sky, surprisingly peaceful, before collapsing to the ground with a soft thud sending up a cloud of ash and spores.

Behind her General Lumnus stood, tattered cloak billowing behind him. The sharp horns on his helmet glittering in a beam of light, which had momentarily shone through a break in the ash. His grime-covered golden carapace glowed like treasure for a second before being obscured by shadow and another wave of ash. The cinderwind was dying down.

Her father rushed forward across the stones kneeling next to her in the ash, “Sunny! Sunny! are you alright?”

Another gust of wind blew past them and suddenly the ash was gone. The wall of the storm was past and she scanned in a haze, as the great billowing wall of ash and smoke retracted across the valley as a curtain is withdrawn across a stage. The sound of the distant volcanoes reached their ears once again, fire and magma billowing from the land.

As ash receded from their battleground, she could see the carnage they had left. Bodies strewn over the stone, some still moaning, others quite still. The remainder of their small unit stood in various states of injury and disarray.

“I… I’m alright, father,” she stammered as he pulled her to her feet.

His bright yellow eyes cut across the now-open landscape searching methodically for any other sign of attack. Sunny saw nothing but the tail end of the next patrol heading in the opposite direction. General Lumnus relaxed, setting a hand on her shoulder and turning to the remainder of their party.

While a least twenty of their enemy's number had been disabled by the superior fighting skills of Sunny’s clan, they had not gone without losses. Three of their ten had perished; a single battle pair that had been overwhelmed in the original attack and then a second who lay upon the ground gasping with the death rattle. Sunny could hear it, the sucking gurgling noise that came from someone as their lungs filled with blood.

General Lumnus approached quietly with Sunny at his side. A young male warrior, battle pair to the dying, sat by her side cradling her gasping head in his arms as he stroked a gentle hand down her cheek. The wound she carried was grievous, the end of a spear had broken off between the chest plates on her armor, embedding itself deep within her chest cavity. Behind him, the horizon was alight with slowly dripping rivers of fire. Purple lightning crackled through billowing waves of ash and a flock of low-flying ash skimmers cut a wide circle above their heads.

Bright orange bubbled from her mouth and the two phnupernum at the base of her neck.

Even as she gasped for air, her eyes were distant, showing no fear or disquiet.

“It was an honor, my love,” the young male crooned, gently wiping her mouth with a hand smearing her blood onto his own skin. “May the spirits carry you swiftly to the afterlife.”

General Lumnus raised his spear slightly and the young male looked up, eyes sad but also proud.

“Do you wish to, or shall I?” Her father asked, his strong, somber voice carrying with a quiet reverent resonance across the ash.

With a purging sigh, the young Drev laid his mate’s head softly upon the ash and stood, holding out a hand to his superior, “I will do it.”

General Lumnus passed the spear to him.

With one last look of sorrow, the young male raised the spear in all four clasped hands, fingers flexing against the cold metal. He waited for a long moment, eyes raised to the heavens. As he did, his expression changed from sadness to one of quiet peace and then… he plunged the blade down. The body of his battle mate jerked and fell serenely still.

The blade sliced softly against skin upon its exit. The young widower lifted his head to the sky, but this time with a quiet look of pleasure. “An honorable death,” he stated with a nod of his head.

“The greatest honor,” her father agreed.

The rest of the crowd had slowly come to gather with them, dispatching anything that still moved as they made their way over. It wouldn’t do to leave a worthy enemy choking in the dust to suffer.

“Another attack successfully thwarted,” General Lumnus announced, “and a great reason for celebration!” His voice had risen, booming mightily over the silent ash. “Three of our number have died with honor, to be accepted as warriors in the afterlife.” A cheer rose up around them. “As warriors in life, heroes they shall be in death and blessed be those who fought by their sides.” Another cheer rose up, nine battle cries hammering the air and echoing through the ash.

“And,” General Lumnus began, his voice quiet but brimming with great pride, “my daughter, ” Sunny felt herself grow cold as eyes turned to look at her, some seeming surprised that she was still there, some even appearing confused, “The glorious induction of my daughter, who has slain TWO in battle here today, officially into the clan as one of our number.” He grabbed her highest arm and raised it into the sky. She was still clinging to her bloodied spear, “A good way to come of age, on the field of glorious combat!”

For a horrible moment Sunny could feel the silence. She envisioned how stupid she would look when no noise was made, how her father would react with anger and confusion when the clan did nothing. Perhaps they would laugh.

But then the roar rose up and for the first time in her life Sunny was enfolded in the arms of warm praise. Hands patted her back, slapped her armor and cheered her accomplishment. One member of the clan brought forward two small chunks of carapace harvested from the fallen, one purple, the other green and Sunny was told to have them incorporated into her armor when she finally received some of her own.

Inside her chest her heart burned with pleasure and excitement, finally surrounded by warm expressions and Drev who accepted her as an authentic warrior.

Maybe she was a real warrior.

Maybe the whole clan would finally accept her.

Maybe…her mother would be proud


	22. Chapter 22

The longest recorded duration a human has gone without sleep was 11 days. Unlike other species, humans require a set amount of time spent unconscious, without which may result in death 

-

Dr. Krill had been on the humans' ship for 10 centicycles and 4 millicycles and in that time he had gone from regretting his decision, to being pleased with his decision, right back to regretting his decision. Based on his calculations, he would say that this particular cycle repeated itself every centicycle. However, sometimes he would be interrupted in the middle of a cycle just so he could restart. Generally, the smugness of his decision outweighed his despair.

For a creature who spent a great deal of time thinking very carefully through every decision; so much so that he could chart, map, and diagram all future possibilities, he had suddenly done something extremely out of character. He hadn't even thought of the consequences the council back on his home world would impose. He doubted they would be particularly pleased.

Now that he was here, he wasn't of use to the collective whole. In fact, he was doing the exact opposite. The humans had a word...selfish. His job back at the trauma center had been twofold, he had been a surgeon and a doctor, that was a given. But in truth, he was actually there to further peace and understanding between the Galactic Assembly and the Vrul.

Every Vrul was part of the system and every Vrul had a very specific job to uphold, a hive society if you will. The population was kept at a very specific and stable number known only by the council and once you became redundant, you would be removed. Generally, everything the Vrul did was based on their survival and nothing more. In fact, they had only bothered to pursue space travel in hopes of discovering hospitable planets for them to colonize thereby increasing the survival of their species.

However, in the quest they had made contact with the Galactic Assembly, then only the Rundi, and came to realize that there was the potential to face threats from off-world. Knowing that, it seemed only logical for their survival to make an agreement with the strange aliens and join their consortium. Of course, when that was all said and done, the Vrul realized that more than lip service was expected. Joining this mutualistic relationship meant the Vrul were obligated to participate in affairs off-world.

The Vrul had agreed, though grudgingly, and thus they had created the rotation that had allowed Krill off-world in the first place. The Vrul were known for their extreme specialization and expertise. Where other species allowed their populaces to choose their own jobs, the Vrul did not, and that meant years and years more experience for their experts as compared to other planets.

So in turn for security promised by the GA, the Vrul loaned some of these experts, fully intending to eventually recall them for their intended purpose on-world. Krill had been a notable exception to that rule having REQUESTED his transfer to the trauma center.

Why he had done so was a question he wasn't entirely sure he could answer. He wanted to say it was because he was attempting to gain new medical knowledge for the advancement of his species, but he was too logical to lie to himself and deep down he knew that his real motivation had something to do with the monotonous nature of his assigned work. The Vrul were a very careful species by nature, so other than the occasional freak accident, he hadn't really been involved in any traumatic surgeries. There were a few times he had performed medical procedures to reverse minor genetic mutations, but anything more complicated than that and the Vrul didn't even bother to keep the newly pupated Vrul alive.

Better just to try next time.

It was the same situation with illness. Of course, they would treat the minor ones, but when the issue became a major drain on time and resources, they would quit treatment and allow the patient to either die or recover on their own. Even if the freak accident caused something they could fix, if the output capacity of the Vrul's usefulness was reduced, the sufferer would also be terminated.

Krill hadn't exactly liked either of those options. Of course, it didn't have anything to do with his sense of empathy or morality like other species because the Vrul didn't really have either. He was a Vrul and this behavior was practical and sensible. If it wasn't, they wouldn't practice it.

What bothered him was the idea that he HAD the ability to restore and heal, no question. He had the ability to determine the outcome, but he had never been allowed to practice his skills and test his knowledge. Fortuitously, he had been transferred to the intergalactic trauma center at one of the major crossroads for commerce and there he had been exposed to medical situations the likes of which he had never seen. There were so many other species more intent on keeping their wounded alive and their sick well than the Vrul had ever been.

In his first week he had LOST patients despite his best efforts, but instead of being discouraged he only vowed to become a better physician, never wishing for what was back on his home planet, despite his nature telling him that he should. It seemed, his uncharacteristically obsessive nature may have been his undoing, considering that it wasn't long before even that was not enough. Generally, the crux of the matter was that the patients tended to die long before he could fix the issue, whether it was from the loss of their vital liquids or some other excuse.

He had held the theory for the longest time that if he could just keep a patient alive long enough, he could remedy any ailment including reattaching limbs. However, when most creatures lose an appendage they generally die horrifically and in a lot of agony. It was this logical sequence of thought that led him to this conclusion and his presence aboard the human ship.

Aboard the human ship for only a short time, Krill learned that medical procedures that he had only assumed could happen in theory were routine; limbs were re-attached on a regular basis. But the humans didn't just stop there, they could transplant the organs of donors into live patients with organ failure. They also performed brain surgery while the patient was cognizant. He now possessed first-hand knowledge of humans surviving extreme situations and after serious trauma.

He supposed that's really why he was here, because he didn't yet know everything there was to know.

Apparently, there were human surgeons who did trauma work on a daily basis and there was something about that that displeased him greatly. He was the most decorated surgeon in the galaxy, yet some biped with opposable thumbs and only two cortical hemispheres was routinely outperforming him in the operating room. Those thoughts brought him to his current human companions. And he wondered once again, how such a fact could be true when the benchmark for the human species was..... this.

Their "Captain." was being chased off, once again by the PA who was becoming increasingly annoyed with his antics and despite her anger he didn't seem to be affected in the slightest. Looking up at the big, dumb human, Krill became even more rankled, thinking about all those similar creatures out there making history with their medical knowledge. Medical knowledge they likely didn't even know how to use.

"Why are you still here?" the PA snarled.

"I was actually just getting ready to leave, if you must know," the captain said, plucking a tongue-depressor from a dispenser on the wall and immediately contaminating it with his nasty human germs and wasting resources. The PA stalked up and snatched the contaminated item from his hand before tossing it in the medical waste receptacle.

"I know I have asked this before, but don't you have a job?"

The captain plopped himself down on one of the hospital beds, much to her annoyance. "Actually, it is very difficult to captain a ship, when that ship is in warp. Warp, my friend, is entirely computerized so I have a bit of a break. Not to mention that I specifically schedule the whole 'captaining' thing to terminate before 1900 hours so that gives me at least a four-hour grace period. Also, due to the nature of my captaining activities, that usually means I lose about an hour or two, but since I have budgeted for that in mind, that means I have at least two hours to myself and that means two hours to.... Oh I don't know: watch Tv, listen to music, play games, or annoy the medical staff." he held up a finger, "Now that is on the addendum that the medical staff doesn't have something MEDICAL to attend to."

With a growl she brandished a capped syringe at him, "If you are here for much longer I WILL have something medical to attend to."

"Oh isn't that sweet. Threats on my life."

She sighed and lowered the syringe, "Sometimes I wonder if you know how dumb you seem."

"You are assuming that I am hiding how smart I actually am, and that I am not, in fact, just as dumb as I look."

"I am hoping that the UNSC had enough sense to vette candidates before allowing them to command a ship."

He grinned at her, "Nope, they tossed me the keys and told me to be home by midnight."

"Get up," she growled, and he leaped down as she began smoothing out the wrinkles on the sheets and then plumping the pillow.

"If you would excuse me, I really must go." He turned to face Krill, "Alright, that's your first day aboard my ship. If you have any serious questions or concerns and I do mean serious, come to my quarters. They are right next to the bridge down the right hallway. I had the marines secure a space for you on the administrative deck, furthest door on the right. I wasn't sure what manner of furnishings you required, but it comes with a desk and some other minor things. If you need anything, I'll have a chat with the quartermaster and see if we can requisition the items you require. If that's all, I think this is goodnight."

Krill stared at him blankly, "What's so good about it?"

The captain just stared at him for a long moment then sighed, "It's a goodbye Krill. I am politely wishing that you have a good night."

He turned to the PA, "We should be in warp for another day or two to better give our coolant system a break. If nothing goes horribly wrong and you aren't too busy, I would suggest compiling a list of any equipment you think we may need or we are low on so that when I talk to requisitions you will get what you need ASAP."

"Yes, sir."

He had been stepping towards the door but paused with one raised eyebrow just waiting..."Sir? Well, that's new. What happened to idiot and gigantic waste of space?"

She smiled slightly as she turned away to continue cleaning her equipment, "Because you were acting like a Captain just then."

He waved a hand as he walked out, "Bad news kids, since I AM the captain my actions determine what a captain acts like; therefore, everything I do is acting like a captain." The doors hissed open before him as he stepped out into the hall.

The PA snorted as the door closed behind him, "We will have to agree to disagree."

The remaining human crew was busy packing items away.

"We should be done here soon," the PA said, looking over at Krill. "That's all for your first day so you can head up to your office, get settled in, or explore the ship if you would like. Just stay out of trouble. You are my responsibility after all."

Just off to Krill's left side one of the humans was arranging her facial features in a very unusual formation. The mouth had opened wide as she sucked in an excessively large breath. In time with this strange behavior, the human arched her back to such an extent that Krill could see the outline of her ribcage through the light blue covering she wore.

He stepped back a little in confusion.

Across the room one of the other humans did the same until nearly all the humans had performed the action at least once.

"Oh, knock it off you guys!" the PA growled, covering her mouth with her hand. "I still have an hour!"

Krill looked around at the humans watching as a few more of them covered their mouths in response. What were they doing? Was it a signal? Was it some sort of contagion? Was it dangerous? Did bending their spines that much hurt?

"Is everything alright?" he inquired.

The PA walked past Krill and towards the back of the room, "Everything is fine doctor, head up to your office. We can finish up here." He paused in the doorway for a moment, not entirely sure if he believed the human or not, but eventually he gave up and departed, followed by the soft hiss of the doors as they shut behind him. It was then he realized just how alone he was. He had no Vrul and now he had no medical personnel to confer with. That left him alone on an alien ship without a solid understanding of his environment or purpose.

As he stood there, groups of humans in groups of two or three passed by him, always turning their bright, perceptive eyes to appraise him as they went past, chittering to each other in their powerful, human voices only to vanish around the next corner over.

He couldn't help but stare back.

The way their bodies moved was so strange and alien, a system made up of both smooth, fluid movements and sharp jerking motions. Their eyes twitched constantly, their heads followed suit, but their bodies were nothing short of poetry. It was a strange thing to witness and it both bothered him and fascinated him at the same time. What was worse, he had done the calculations based on weight distribution and mass and it seemed that the humans center of balance was not conducive to them walking upright. For someone like the captain, center of mass was towards the lower portion of his chest. Some of the female humans carried their weight a little lower, but even that was not enough to explain how they managed to balance.

He paused in one of the hallways, having memorized the layout of the entire ship on their first round through and watched as a group of humans stood speaking with each other in a tight circle. With intense interest he leaned forward a little examining their feet and the way they stood. The first thing he noticed, despite being in a large circle, none of the humans were directly facing each other, their bodies somehow managed to point directly between the gaps provided by their other human companions. The way they stood, widening the base of their stance making a more stable platform, yet shifting and swaying continually, never actually standing still. He wondered if any one of them had simply frozen in place, they would have fallen over?

Quite fascinating, a human never seemed to be properly balanced, but created that illusion by constantly adjusting the sway. The sheer delicacy of micro muscles in the feet and legs was astounding, almost difficult to fathom.

He watched in great interest for a very long time, their body posture, the way they used their hands as they spoke, the specific use of eye contact or not; trying to parse out the particular nuances of human behavior. Regrettably, it seemed the more he began to understand the less he actually knew. As soon as one question was answered, two more stepped in to take its place. He leaned forward a little more intently taking in every minute movement, every expression, every gesture of the hands.

Due to his meticulous scrutiny, Krill noticed the instant one of the humans stiffened; head lifting, shoulders squaring, head turning as if he had heard a noise. It was within the next moment that Krill found himself eye to eye with the human from across the hallway. Stony brown eyes locked onto him with the precision of a military targeting system.

It was as if the human had KNOWN he was there.

They stared at each other for a very long moment, the human's eyebrows scrunching together as its head tilted sideways. Its rubbery mouth was cut downwards in a frown.

Krill shivered and stepped back, the human's lanky-towering form was strangely juxtaposed against its tilted head in a way that was unnatural and unnerving. Krill turned sharply and hurried away, imagining those infinite eyes still staring at him as he plunged around a corner and down another deserted hallway. He tried to think back on what noise he could have made to alert the human to his presence but couldn't recall any way the human could have known he was there.

The way it had looked at him sent an eruption of disquieted tingling through his body.

The human had looked at him as if it had intended to draw him in with its eyes and control him or to look into him.

He wasn't aware that humans had any telepathic prowess, not that any members of the GA did, but there were rumors of species that WERE capable. Perhaps the humans utilized some sort of hypnotic trait, a way to confuse the brain in order to paralyze their prey?

It didn't seem likely, but maybe Krill was right and was just trying to reject the theory out of fear.

He had never been one to discount his judgment and genius, but he was quickly learning that fear was a great way to cloud one's senses. Of course the Vrul were known for their sense of fear, but it was more a philosophical sense of fear related to the future and what was to happen to their species. They lived under a canopy of impending doom, always in the recesses of their thought. But here, surrounded by alien predators, he was learning real fear; the debilitating, overwhelming sense of danger.

Luckily, he didn't meet any other humans on his way up to the office. He found it exactly where the human said it would be, indicating that the captain had a good sense of direction or knew where things were on his ship and could navigate and give directions like an intelligent life form. That was an encouraging sign.

The door hissed open for him and the perimeter floor light clicked on. It was dull and yellow, creating an atmosphere that was both grimy and impersonal at the same time. There was a dust-covered desk, a chair bolted to the floor and a line of cabinets along one side. Everything in the room was made of practical, industrial steel and put off an air of hard, cold simplicity and functionality.

He took a moment to examine the lights and found that the sallow light casings were covered in a layer of dust. It took a kilocycle to clear the dust from the lights, trying not to think about the origin of the dust covering the light. Finally, the yellow light was gone, replaced by a blazing white that turned the dingy room into a stark, simple living area.

Having worked in a hospital for so long, he enjoyed the familiarity the room created.

Inspecting the small space, he found the lights and temperature of the room could be adjusted, a fact that he took quick advantage of transforming the room into something that was closer to his liking.

Approaching the desk, he noticed a blinking red light at the center. He contemplated its function, staring at it for a few minutes. It was only after he extended his upper limb towards the light that he discovered its purpose. As he made contact with the light, an explosion of holographic projections expanded into the room. He stepped back in surprise but on closer examination was pleased when he realized that these were the files the PA had promised to send him.

He had expected to get the diagrams detailing the anatomy of a human female, what he did not expect was all the other files he had been sent. There was a memo attached to the first hologram which read, 'You need more information and instruction than I first assumed."

He wasn't entirely sure why that note irritated him, but he opened the folder and was shocked to find thousands upon thousands of files. The first file was the anatomy of a female human, the second file was a matching set for a male human and the third set was actually for all genetic variations of humans that were exclusive of the first two. He had had no idea that possibility existed, but apparently it was something quite probable. The folders that followed were entire storage cells dedicated to: anatomy, physiology, biology, chemistry, genetics, virology, neurology, pathology and so much more. There were thousands of documents here.

Next came hundreds of medical textbooks and comprehensive volumes compiled by humans of their collective knowledge about medicinal practices, areas, histories, remedies and cures. It was such a wealth of medical knowledge that Krill was nearly overwhelmed.

He had never seen anything like it. Of course he had access to databases full of medical information, but there was just so much and ALL of it written and stitched together by humans. There were thousands of charts, scans and diagrams and despite the primitive nature of their machines, the information was MORE than workable.

Even with four separate cortical hemispheres which allowed him to read more than one document at a time and eidetic memory and a genius IQ in human standards, it would take Krill countless cycles to study all this new information. He would of course, be hindered by the language barrier, by its lack of translatability into the Vrul language. None of these medical terms would be transferable.

Of course, he HAD memorized all the words that had heard thus far and he could UNDERSTAND some of what the humans were saying without the assistance of a translation device, but that was a far cry from the written word. Running a quick exchange algorithm on the attached files, it was only able to translate up to 66.7% of the words present and even then it was not done particularly well. He would have to spend a night or two with a dictionary and a grammar textbook in order to develop an in depth understanding of the human's written language in order to properly learn all the information.

Language was one thing about the humans that he didn't have an issue with. Their written language was sensible: organized into neat letters which represented sounds, when combined made words which represented a thing or idea and words strung together created sentences which formed thoughts, concepts and information. The files themselves could be read, translated and placed into compressed audio files on a whim. Compared to the Rundi or Tesraki script, it was one of the best he had ever seen for the transfer of information.

As he was scrolling through the massive database, he discovered something called a "search bar." Upon testing it, he found that that particular piece of programing could locate and bring him the information that he wanted in a matter of moments. It was quite an amazing tool. He had never thought about such a program feature since he was capable of remembering every article, book, chart and page he had ever examined, but with a database this big he could request any piece of information and it would be brought TO HIM. This tool was invaluable as he had, as of yet, been unable to determine a catalog system for the information he had been given.

There were a few other tools he discovered as well, including something that gave him access to "the internet," whatever that was. There was so much he needed to do first that he had no time to search right now. He had already spent too much time marveling over the vast quantity of data that had been given to him, seemingly offhand.

He wondered if the human was aware of the potential danger she had put her species in by giving those files to him? Of course he was no threat and her disseminating this information to him would ultimately help the PA with her work and with her species.

He needed to quit musing, get back to the medical bay to speak with the PA about getting himself a dictionary and a book of grammar rules so that he could finally start deciphering all of the information. With a bit of a scuttle and expression as close to enthusiastic as a Vrul ever got, Krill approached the door and entered the hallway.

It took him a few paces down the hallway to realize that something was strange and it took standing frozen in the center of the passageway for another few trilicyles to figure out what it was....

The ship was quiet, too quiet.

Earlier the hallways had been filled with humans, the echoing of feet and voices and now there was nothing but dead silence. Not the clatter of a single foot on metal, not a hum or a grunt from any human voice. He listened harder, straining his own senses to detect any hint of human life aboard the ship, but found nothing more than the distant throbbing pulse of the engines reverberating from deep within the ship. The longer he stood, the more the silence engulfed him like the insidious creep of dermal-rot.

Plagued with unease, Krill hesitantly made his way down the ship's corridors, now much larger and more menacing than they had been when occupied by the humans. He hadn't noticed it before, but ever since arriving on board the ship, there had not been one moment in which he had experienced silence. There were always voices, the sound of their movement, noises as they went about their work or as they scurried about the tunnels and tubes within the bowels of their ship. All of that was gone, leaving him isolated and alone with his thoughts as he crept up the hallway, plagued by malignant apprehension.

It felt outrageous, but a part of him was beginning to wonder if the humans hadn't tricked him and now they were gathering to pack hunt him and consume him. Perhaps they were silently pursuing him, at this very moment creeping down the hall to ultimately reach out their claw-tipped fingers to grasp around his neck.

He spun in a tight circle only to find that he was isolated in the hallway, a single figure alone on this big, empty ship.

Even the lights overhead seemed strangely despondent, as if he had stepped into another reality without knowing it.

He had just turned down the next hallway when it happened. He registered the change as a sort of pop on the air, a sound which echoed towards him down the hallway. He turned back in his original direction and squinted. A spot of black had appeared in his vision and as he looked the pop came again.

The dark spot grew bigger.

He continued to stare as the pattern continued until he finally realized what he was seeing. The lights were beginning to shut themselves off. He could see it creeping up the hallway towards him, plunging the corridor into systematic blackness.

Pop

Pop

Pop

Darkness creeping down the hallway, growing ever larger in his vision.

He stepped back as a wave of fear washed over him, he turned around, intending to outrun the growing darkness, but there was no use. He was engulfed by it a second later and watched as in reverse and parallel order the light vanished in the other direction, leaving him in near darkness.

Another click and just as he was about to adjust back to his thermal vision, another set of lights flicked on.

These were strange, lights taken straight from the red spectrum. They glowed strongly enough to illuminate the corridor, but not nearly strong enough to chase away great swaths of pooling shadow and there he was standing in the eerie darkness of the hallway, once lit with powerful white lights now replaced by a bloody red in collusion with the darkness rather than in opposition.

He spun around in a tight circle, the paranoia rising up inside him with a horrible certainty. It was as if he could feel the presence of something watching him, although he KNEW that was not logically possible. Then again, his mind began to travel back to his original thoughts, what if he wasn't being paranoid? What if this really WAS a plot by the humans to hunt him down for sport. At any moment he expected one of them to come leaping from the darkness, bathed in bloody light, teeth glistening with rabid hunger.

The longer he stood, the more the fearful tension intensified until he felt as if he was drowning in a sea of unseen eyes. He had never experienced a fear so great in his entire life.

He stood for what must have been many cycles just waiting for the inevitable attack on his person, but it never came. He was, as it seemed, isolated in the darkness with nothing but his own inner thoughts for company.

As he began to make his way down the hall, he almost wished the humans would just get it over with and kill him. The suspense was far worse than getting ripped apart, because at least one was certain and structured, while the other was nebulous and played tricks on his mind. Dr. Krill didn't like feeling out of control or irrational, but with every step he was racked with paranoia and the feeling of someone watching him, though he could see no one. It reminded him earlier when that human seemed to know when he was looking in it's direction. Perhaps that was a characteristic of being human. Perhaps they did have some sort of telepathic communication or extra sense or awareness to which he was now just registering?

Why was he a target? Did the humans use the whole galaxy as their hunting grounds? And why did the humans insist on hunting in the dark, if that was in fact what they were doing? Did humans have night vision that he wasn't aware of? Was there something about the dark that made them stronger? Could they sense where he was inside the ship, and were they even now congregating in some cramped and stuffy room, their horrible squishy bodies churning and writhing together as they prepared for a feast.

NO!

He had to stop thinking like that, it wasn't logical. Humans had been in the galactic assembly for more than a few cycles now. Behavior like what he was envisioning would have been observed, documented, alerted and dealt with. There was no reason for him to be as worried as he was.

....

Except for the fact that...as far as he knew... he was the only nonhuman who had ever been isolated aboard a human ship. If there had been others, they had not survived to warn the GA. Would the GA or his species notice or even care if he went missing?

He had made it to the med bay doors now and with more than a little apprehension, stepped forward. As the doors hissed open, he found himself bathed in a cascade of soft blue light. It washed around his feet and spilled down the corridor as he stepped into the room, doors closing behind him. The bright sterile lights from earlier had morphed into the calming blue which now surrounded him.

Quickly surveying the room, he realized there was no one here. The room was unoccupied.

The hulkingly primitive human machines crouched as dark shadows in out-of-the-way corners as packages of sharp implements glittered quietly on their shelves. The bedside curtains hung lank and lifeless towards the ground.

Quietly inflating his hydrogen sack, so he hovered a few inches off the floor, Doctor Krill propelled himself forward, looking around in great apprehension behind the curtains and under the tables and chairs.

Not a human in sight.

He floated up to peer through the doors into the surgical suite and saw nothing but a sterile room bathed in that same blue light.

He didn't know what it was or how to describe it, but the way the operating table/chair sat at the center of the room was.... eerie at best and terrifying at worst.

Backing away from the window and turning around to face the medical bay, he made his decision. There was one surefire way of finding out what was going on. The Captain said he would be in his quarters if Krill needed anything, so that is precisely where he would go. If the human wasn't there, then Krill would know that something was wrong and he would find a place to hide. If the human was there, then maybe he could explain exactly what was going on.

Perhaps there was a rational explanation for all of this strange behavior and he would feel like a simpleton when it was all said and done.

Still, he couldn't keep his fear at bay as he floated across the med bay and back out into the dark tunnels of the human ship.

The captain's quarters were two decks up, past the communal deck and forward towards the bridge. The thought of making his way across the ship in this sort of menacing darkness made his insides crawl, but there was no other option. The soothing blue light from behind was cut off with a soft hiss as he once again found himself in the industrial maze, alone and outnumbered, floating silently through the corridors, listening and watching for any sound of life.

Still, he heard nothing but the thrumming of the engines, manifested as vibrations through the metal of the ship.

He reached the next deck in safety while the distant thrumming of the engines grew quieter. This was the communal deck which contained the "mess hall," crew quarters and the "entertainment" areas. So many words to learn...Krill snapped his attention back to his surroundings.

The closest stairs leading up were only a few feet in front of him with an open hallway to his left and a half-open doorway to his right.

He didn't know what made him stop before advancing onto staircase. He didn't know what kind of insanity possessed him to turn to his right and gaze into the unfathomable darkness of that room.

It was so silent.

In desperation for some hint of light or life, he switched to his thermal vision and was surprised to find a heat signature. Why had he not thought to use his thermal vision earlier? Fear was a powerful reaction from which he was gaining much knowledge and insight.

Krill froze in surprise thinking at first that there was a human crouched just inside the darkness waiting for him, before realizing that was not the case at all. The human was across the room, lying prone at an unusual height

Confused, he moved forward and as he did, other heat signatures blossomed in his vision. They were positioned in a very strange pattern; eight of them all together, four spaced at lower points closer to the floor and then more positioned above each of the lower four each lying in a prone position on their sides, on their backs and even one uncomfortably placed on the stomach. As he drew closer he realized that their body temperatures had dropped almost a degree or two.

As he silently floated closer they did not move.

These humans that seemed never to stop were lifeless and didn't even acknowledge his presence

With silent trepidation, he approached the nearest human, a big and hulking figure curled into a condensed ball on his side, one hand resting on the strange padded table on which he lay. Cloth covered part of the prone figure and spilled over the edge of the table and pooled on the floor.

Krill gently reached out an appendage, resting it on the arm of the unresponsive human, checking for a pulse like the PA had taught him. Every time he had seen a human their pulse was somewhere between 65-100, but as he counted he felt his insides grow cold. This human had a heart rate as low as 46 beats.

A horrible tingling sensation ran through his body as he floated away from the motionless human.

What was this?

What was happening?

He racked his brains trying to figure out what was going on and came up with two distinct possibilities.

Either the humans were sick or they were drugged.

It made sense based on what he knew. These strange tables or 'beds' on which all the humans now lay were also in the sick bay. The captain had even asked to be placed on one during his recovery from surgery. The drugging theory also made sense considering that the only time he had ever seen an unresponsive human was when the captain had been on a plethora of analgesic medication.

But this realization only made things worse. If the humans had been drugged, then by who and what were they planning on doing with unresponsive humans? It would have taken someone with great expertise and planning to incapacitate an entire ship full of humans and anyone who was capable of doing that was surely capable of much worse things.

If they were sick, then things were just as bad. He wasn't capable of treating a ship wide endemic. He had yet to read the first page of the medical documents he had been sent and although he was brilliant, studying took time, which these humans might not have. Turning his attention back to the humans, he assessed their symptoms: decreased heart rate, slower respirations, lowered temperature, lack of muscle tone and temporary paralysis except with the eyes which seemed to be darting back and forth under the thin epidermal layer covering them.

Whatever the toxin was, he would wager to say that it was neurological in nature. Yes, the contaminant affected the heart and the lungs, but both were controlled by the brain, as was temperature regulation of the body, eye movement and responsiveness.

So the humans may have been struck by a sudden and acute neurological malady?

He backed away from the unresponsive human trying to determine what he should do. They were not dead yet and he wouldn't be able to handle something like this on his own. He would need the medical staff, someone familiar with humans to help assess and administer relief.

In that case, it did not change his original plans. He needed to notify the captain, make sure that he had not been overcome with this illness and seek direction.

As he floated from the room and up the stairs, Dr Krill was struck by the horrible thought that his first day aboard the human ship would be marked with him losing all of them.

He was a doctor and here were potentially hundreds of sick patients and they were all just going to die because he lacked the proper medical knowledge to treat this species.

Could it have been something the captain and other humans had picked up during their tenure at the medical facility and then subsequently spread through the rest of the ship. It would make some sense, but then again it also didn't. The PA told him that the human body responds to infection by increasing the body temperature and not lowering it. However, there was always the possibility that the human immune system had not been ready for a new bacteria or virus and so had not had time to respond before it had injured their brains.

He floated off the stairs and into another hallway. The bridge wasn't that far now and he could see the opening to the captain's quarters at the halfway mark. All around him, the darkness of the ship seemed to be growing with greater intensity as he realized that he was flying through space in a metal box full of corpses.

How would he get back home?

How was he to contact anyone?

No, he had to focus. He would think about that when the time came, but for now, he had to focus on the task at hand.

Speeding up his pace, he hurriedly floated down the corridor, following the Captain's instructions until he reached the door. This one did not open immediately upon his arrival, stopping in confusion and looking around for a way in. As he did, he heard a soft buzzing noise and looked up just in time to be blinded by a bright green light that ran itself up and down his body before vanishing.

There was no time to react before the door hissed open softly.

He was immediately struck by panic.

This room was dark, strangely so, illuminated only from the opposite wall by a wide projected screen covered by the heat shields and looking out into a projected darkness of space. Only the illumination of the red lights in the hallway and the faint radiance of stars cast any light into the room. Switching back to thermal vision, he found what he had hoped not to find.

The captain lay, as had the others, cool and silent at the far end of the room. His heat signature was a dull sort of glow masked partially by a strange accumulation of fabric which had been thrown over the body.

Dr. Krill stepped a little further into the room.

Starlight, shining in from the void of artificial space, glowed softly on the man's slack face, a pale reflection on his wan skin. His missing eye had been uncovered, though you wouldn't have known upon seeing him like this.

In a way, he looked peaceful.

Except his breathing came in small, shallow bursts and the membrane over one ocular cavity was twitching frantically belying the peaceful expression he wore.

This was a stage of disease Krill had not seen before.

The twitching eye convinced Krill that it was neurological.

Everything inside his body felt like it was sinking. He couldn't believe this. Still holding onto his fear, Krill stepped further into the room reaching out his upper limb to place it on the open flat of the exposed wrist, feeling for that telltale pulse.

Surprisingly, he found it to be at 62 beats per cycle, much higher than the last human, though he surmised that his elevated pulse might be due to the strange distress the human seemed to be experiencing during his illness-induced unconsciousness. His single eye was still twitching rapidly behind his ocular membrane.

Distant stars spun past them and the color about the room grew into a soft dull red accented in blue as their simulated journey took them past a field of stars. Krill looked down at the human with worry and confusion as the red light passed over his skin.

He was sure it was neurological. No other diagnosis fit the evidence. And that meant there was one guaranteed way to ascertain if there was trauma to the cortical tissue. The PA had explained the basics of human neurological responsiveness and one of those was specifically tested through the dilation and contraction of the pupil when in contact with light.

If the pupil did not react to light you could assume that, either the person was blind or there was some extreme neurological dysfunction preventing the person's eyes from reacting properly.

Krill leaned forward over the prone human and reached out with a hand.

It was the sclera Krill saw first, a gooey expanse of slimy white mucus-covered membrane shot through with little red veins. The eye had rolled back into the ocular cavity, requiring Krill shift the head until the iris came into view, a deep green ringed in little bands of blue and shot through with light streaks of yellow. The eye was listless in the socket, unfocused in the skull as it rested.

Still no response.

Krill moved a bit closer for a closer examination.

The eye snapped straight at him.

The pupil expanded violently and Krill was engulfed by a sudden sensation of extreme alarm, followed by fear and, unexpectedly, anger.

He couldn't have said what happened next. It was too fast for him to keep up, too shocking and violent for him to truly understand. Something slammed hard into his chest and his surroundings spun and flipped. Fake projected stars spun in a dizzying spiral to his side and then an eruption of pain shot through his back as he was violently slammed to the floor. Luckily his hydrogen sack had been partially inflated, cushioning his head from the impact.

But that didn't matter for he was still in danger.

Something was clamped very tightly around his neck, crushing him while trying to rip him apart.

His vision struggled to adjust and when it did he was met by a snarl, milky white teeth barred inches from his face. A crazed green eye was cut by a plunging brow, while the other eye was nothing more than a staring empty socket.

The human crouched over him, massive, powerful hands around his throat, veins bulging on the human's forearms, a delicate blue shadows through his white skin.

Krill was going to die.

And then as the human looked at him, not just looked, but recognized him, the expression on the captain's face had morphed into one of confusion. The pressure on Krill's throat was released and the human fell back against a wall. Looking down in shock, Krill realized the human was not wearing his fake leg, supporting himself with one leg and two clenched hands. As the seconds wore on, the human's erratic breathing transformed into short, quivering gasps. The eye stared wide and wild as one hand rested against the human's chest, the other still on the floor for support. The human looked afraid, close to panic, though Krill couldn't have said why.

Krill was confused. What kind of malady caused such violent reactions?

"WHAT THE HELL!"

Krill flinched away from the human's anger, as the captain jerked toward him.

"WHAT THE ACTUAL HELL WERE YOU THINKING?" The captain was violently shaking now, the muscles in his arms and hands quivering spastically as he stared at Krill. He slumped back against the wall, "WHAT WERE YOU THINKING? WAKING ME UP LIKE THAT."

Krill still stunned, sat on the floor aware of the pain in his chest and back.

"YOU NEVER WAKE UP A SLEEPING HUMAN LIKE THAT!"

Krill was so disjointed from this reality that the only thing he could say was, "What is sleep?"

The human stopped short and suddenly the anger faded from his expression, melting into confusion and disbelief. He made some sort of gesture and the light in the room slowly altered to a comfortable level, throwing the room into safe reprieve. The bed behind the human was a mess of fabric and lumpy cloth bags tossed everywhere, some even spilling onto the floor. The human himself was scruffy, with hair sticking up in all directions. He was clothed in a white shirt that left his arms uncovered up to the middle of his biceps and strange pants that terminated above the knee leaving his leg and a half bare.

"Sleep... like what I was doing just now."

Krill stared at him uncomprehending.

"You know, the thing that you do every night to...not be exhausted the next day?"

"I still do not understand sleep."

The human's shaking entirely dissipated at this point, "You.... You don't sleep?"

Krill just stared on still halfway in shock. He had almost died and now the human was back to behaving as if they hadn't had that moment just a few seconds back, "I don't know what sleep is."

The human opened his mouth, then closed it and then struggled to find the words, "I.... it's the human activity of being unconscious for a period of time in order to allow the brain to do maintenance and for the body to recharge and rest. It's super important for the health of humans. Generally, we need to be unconscious for around seven or eight hours. If we don't sleep we can get sick, or perform poorly or any number of other things. How do you not know what sleep is?"

"We.... do not sleep," Krill said flatly. "I work continuously. To rest my cortical hemispheres, I turn them off one at a time or three at most if I have the time for it. Most known species rest in a similar fashion and you are telling me you just lay there unconscious for a large portion of your day in order to operate at a proper function?"

The human nodded, though he was making another strange expression, his eyebrows were slanted upwards towards the middle of his face and his mouth was twisted into and expression that partially showed his teeth but also partially did not. He adjusted his weight and crawled across the floor on his hands and single working leg to Krill's side.

"I.... I'm so sorry, had I known I..... I would have told you. I underestimated the differences in our species and see that I have greatly erred in your education. Are you hurt?"

Looking up at the human, it genuinely SEEMED as if he was worried.

"Maybe."

The human's face twisted and his eyes widened, "Doctor, I... I am so sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you. I was startled from a dream and... and I... I just... I didn't even think...I just reacted and rather poorly I am afraid."

Krill sat up, barely listening to the human as he slowly took stock of his injuries. Luckily for him, his head was fine and his back, though sore, was intact. Some of the tissue around his neck had been rubbed away and his chest ached something horrible. The human had come very close to cracking his outer covering, but hadn't.

The human scooted closer to Krill, helping him to an upright position with a surprisingly gentle hand and a worried look. Krill returned his look definitely intending to be angry, to lecture the human on proper safety protocols, to be livid that he had almost been killed by incompetence and a complete failing of the human to mention important things about the human species, but when he looked back at the human he found that...he just...couldn't.

The captain had covered his missing eye with his right hand, but as Krill looked into the remaining eye he got such a sense of.... there was emotion emanating from the pool of green. Was it pain, worry, sorrow, grief?

It was strange to Krill to see emotion reflected from a piece of anatomy, but he found words catching in his throat as he looked at the human's piteous expression and he just couldn't do it.

It was stupid, but he just couldn't be angry at the human, but he was angry due to the situation.

"Honestly doctor, I am so so-"

"REMAIN SILENT and SIT DOWN!"

Eyes widening in surprise, the human slowly lowered himself back onto the floor looking up at the doctor with an expression of confusion, shock and shame.

"This is unacceptable!"

"I kn-:

"Don't interrupt me!" the human went very quiet.

"This is unacceptable, absolutely outrageous. You have failed to give me the information I NEED to do my job correctly. From the beginning you should have been ready for this, you should have provided me with everything I needed to operate on this ship without getting myself or someone else killed."

The human blinked up at him with his single wide eye as Krill continued "Did you even stop to think about what I might need to be successful before I boarded your ship? As captain that is your JOB. Behaving like an adolescent, pestering the medical personnel, treating important matters without due solemnity, but above all else, withholding information and resources necessary to perform our assignments to the best of our ability."

The human's expression fell into a frown, "Hold on. You're not mad that I could have injured you, you are mad that I didn't give you proper information."

"I'm mad that you didn't do your job"

There was a spot of silence.

"It is as if your priorities are skewed. I don't know how you order matters, but it's getting in the way of me being able to do my job aboard this ship"

Off to the side, the fake nebulae continued to swirl and flux, though the overhead light somewhat dimmed the picture.

"Tell you what doc, I'll make sure you have all the information you need, but the next time you wake me up, just turn on a light."


	23. Chapter 23

In the short term, and in dry conditions, the human body can survive temperatures up to 248 F degrees (I20 C) assuming air conditions are at a dry optimal. In the long term with access to water, a human can survive 158 F (70C) though they will be neither productive, or happy about it, and likely with some physiological consequences.

_

"Look, all I'm sayin' is a rock is a rock is a rock, it doesn't matter where it is or where it is from. We've been up here a little over a month, and all we have done is look at rocks. It's boring."

"Ok yes, but also you're wrong because these are space rocks which makes them infinitely better. Come on guys, just hear me out. You can take the most boring thing ever, say algebra homework and put it in space, and that would automatically make it pretty awesome because now it's not just algebra, its space algebra."

A groan resonated from the table, catching a few glances from passing crewmen as they carried their trays to open seats in the mess hall.

"Your eternal optimism never ceases to amaze, lieutenant," an older pilot announced, carefully winding an enormous mouthful of spaghetti around his fork before bringing it up to eye level, eyeing the noodles as if he expected them to turn into worms and wriggle away.

Down the table another airman snorted, "If you're so eager, then you can have the next flight, and I can catch up on my show."

The lieutenant leaned over his tray of food nearly knocking over his drink. Luckily, the airman next to him grabbed the bottle and stabilized it, looking unenthusiastic but prepared, as he had taken similar actions on more than one occasion.

"You can't be serious, right? We are in the middle of space in another solar system and you want to watch another episode of what...'Real Housewives of Mars,' or "The Simpsons.'"

He leaned even further forward, nearly flipping his tray over on accident, but saved by the quick thinking airman who pulled the tray out of the way before things went flying. The young pilot gave him a sheepish look before continuing, "Come on guys! We're actually living where people for thousands of years only dreamed of living. We're living like those from Nova, Trans-Galactic, Star Trek, and you mean to tell me you're bored?"

His speech was received with nothing more than blank expressions and unenthusiastic cheering. He wondered if this was what it would feel like to try to rally a group of sloths, except he believed sloths could elicit more enthusiasm.

"Oh, stow the speech lieutenant and sit down."

The young man did so, looking quite defeated. The airman at his right slid the food back into position before quietly going back to his own meal.

"Look, work is always just that, work. This is my job now. It pays like shit, but at least I get fed and quartered so it don't matter where that is, Earth, Mars, the moon. In the end it's all the same: you're born, you work a little and then you die" commented the older pilot. There was a grunt of agreement from around the table.

The lieutenant sullenly stuck a fork into his plate of spaghetti, "I see I am surrounded by adventurers and visionaries. Not a power in the verse could persuade me to give up my spot."

More groaning.

"Oh, stop harassing the kid, It's refreshing to have young blood that isn't as cynical and jaded as the rest of us." The airman who spoke was only a few seats down and craned his neck past the other eye-rolling soldiers to grin at the lieutenant. He was surprisingly old for an airman, with bits of greying stubble at the side of his closely cropped beard.

The lieutenant smiled gratefully back to the soldier before going back to his food, he had probably gushed enough for one day. If there was anything about space that hadn't lived up to his expectations, it was the people more than anything else. They were the best in their field, top of their game but often cynical and jaded. Nothing phased them, nothing excited them, or even evoked the wonder and marvel of their unique position. He got it. This was a job, but man, what a job! It would never get routine for him.

Perhaps that was the difference between the enlisted and the bridge crew. Remembering what it had been like on the day of launch managed to make his insides buzz with electric energy. Hanging out with these guys made his insides...well his insides didn't really do anything aside from grumble a bit, but he assumed that might simply be a product of hunger rather than a product of any external cause.

Attention: Aircraft attendants for hanger B-5 please report to your stations.

The group collectively glanced up towards the sound of the pleasant female voice just as a column of soldiers marched past one of the open mess-hall doors.

"Isn't that the shuttle hanger?"

"I believe it is."

Forks clattered and voices murmured in the packed space around them. With its dull metal interior and exposed ductwork, their ship seemed a little less Star-Trek and a little more Firefly. The pristine white blankness that so often characterized space-ships in science fiction was absent, replaced with an industrial and somber look more akin to the inside of a submarine or an underground bunker.

The lights overhead periodically dimmed and flickered in response to the warp core pulling power. The engineers had theorized this anomaly would occur when they built the thing, and this first warp proved their suspicions. Fortunately, the real-time communications with Earth were not affected by this glitch. If they had to resort to older technology and employ radio signals, it would take each side almost four years to communicate, which would be wildly pointless.

To send communications they would charge the warp core to less than ten percent and then use the power to send a small packet of information, generally radio signals, to just outside lunar orbit where they were then intercepted and sent straight through to mission control back on Earth's surface. The whole process took less than half a minute from start to finish and the lag time was nearly unnoticeable once you had open communication going.

All personnel must be sure to carry operational military ID when boarding the command deck.

They had tested their communications during that first week when the warp core was still cooling down and much of the crew was recovering from the shocking and somewhat terrifying ordeal. No one had died, but more than a few of the engineering crew had been hospitalized due to the extreme heat.

Unfortunately, one person had required skin grafts, but a few discussions with engineers back on earth and a little creative thinking, they had managed to boost the power output on the coolant system using energy taken from the warp core itself to fix the problem, not to mention another theoretical warp sequence that would have them in warp for longer, but probably wouldn't strain the core so much, which Lieutenant Vir thought was pretty damn ingenious.

Then again he tended to think that about anyone who could do mathematics more complicated than your average flight trajectory. Despite being head over heels for science fiction, he wasn't all that scientifically minded. He much preferred operating the stuff the scientists came up with, though he would enthusiastically support their efforts.

Please be sure to place all organic trash in a provided, composting waste receptacle.

He absently prodded the tasteless, slimy pile of spaghetti with his fork and sighed deeply, closing his eyes to feel the distant rumbling of the warp core pulsing up through his feet. Spaghetti should have been an almost religious experience. His mom made the best spaghetti, but what they had done to it here should have warranted a court martial.

There was a sharp buzzing in his right ear as the subdermal communications array sent up an alarm. He shook his head to clear the alarm and then glanced down at the back of his arm where another set of subdermal implants projected a pattern through his skin.

1100 hours

Briefing Room

Command Deck A

He gave his hand a sharp twitch to dismiss the reminder and stood, grabbing his half-eaten meal off the table.

"Where you going?" the airman across from him asked.

"Flight rotation in fifteen minutes, have fun with your Real Housewives."

A few of them laughed and waved him off as he walked over to the organic trash receptacle. He tried to quickly dump his half-full tray, but the amount of organic material pinged a warning and a red holographic banner flashed before his face.

Warning: Lieutenant Vir reduced calorie intake. Caloric intake for lunch should be between 500-650 calories.

He groaned, "Engage manual override."

Access denied.

He growled, paused, and then passed his hand and the traythrough the little red warning banner before sending his uneaten food in the receptacle. He gave the hologram a smug face before turning towards the door. His subdermal implants buzzed and in frustration he turned around just in time to watch the small dispenser to the side of the wall open up.

Please take the calorie replacement bar before you leave

He groaned, but did as told, snatching the stale, rubbery bar from the dispenser as he turned towards the hall. He glanced down at the wrapper, freshly printed and signed. It was one of those mixed protein things flavored with synthetic cocoa powder. It his opinion it might as well have been flavored with synthetic ass.

He shoved the bar in his pocket and walked into the hall straightening his olive green flight suit and nervously hand-combing his hair. A column of marines passed by him in the hallway heading towards one of the cargo bays. A hover lift followed behind, carrying stacked crates tied down with energy ties. He had to press himself to the wall to stay out of the way before continuing down the hall.

All around him doors opened and closed with a metallic hiss. Voices rose from every deck and crevice of the ship. He cut by the Rec Room, chased down the hall by laughter. He could have taken a path to the command deck by way of the normal route but chose instead to slip into a service door and down one of the long, red-lit hallways pressed in close by heavy metal walls and exposed piping. The bulk of the ship appeared a little raw, but the inner structure of the ship made him feel as if he was crawling through her body: exposed piping her veins, and trails of electric wiring her nerves. Here in the bloody light cast by the auxiliary power he could easily imagine being trapped inside the guts of a great beast, the active warp core mimicking the pulsing beat of a heart, adding copiously to his active imaginings.

He turned to the side, where in a little alcove, a narrow ladder had been placed to ascend into the ship. He glanced down either hallway before reaching up to grab onto one of the rungs, pulling himself up with relative ease, the red light illuminating his face and turning his olive drab flight suit into a muddy brown.

Fifteen rungs up and he reached the command deck, taking a step into the adjoining service corridor. He dusted off his hands by resting them on the wall, fingers trailing as he walked towards the briefing rooms. Based on his map of the ship, a mental one he had been augmenting with unauthorized exploration, he knew that he would have to pass by the very room he was to enter before reaching the next access point.

Like any spaceship or submarine, the UNSC Enterprise was divided into airtight segments separated by pressurized doorways. The floors, including the auxiliary tunnels, had been designed in a way to facilitate this Fail-Safe.

If there was a hull breach in one segment of the ship, other segments would be locked down to contain air pressure and life support. Each of the segments had its own functioning life support system so an accident or incident in one area of the ship would not doom the whole crew. Contaminate the air, you contaminate it in one area, contaminate the water, you do it in one area, lose pressure and you lost it in that one area.

It wasn't particularly advantageous for aesthetic appeal, but it was an excellent design from a functional and safety standpoint. He was just passing under another exposed pipe jumping the slim gap from one wall to the other when he heard voices.

"Who did we have on the flight rotation?"

He glanced up at the genesis of the sound suddenly aware of a vent and the minute amount of bright white light which was seeping through its aperture.

"Roster has...hold on a sec...Lieutenant Adam Vir, sir."

The lieutenant paused in his tracks, ears ringing.

"That kid? Are we sure we want him flying this one?"

Vir paused, leaning his head closer to the wall and the opening.

"I don't see any reason why he shouldn't." Lieutenant Vir recognized Chief Palmer's voice.

"I mean no disrespect Chief, but the boy is new and inexperienced and a bit...I am simply wondering if he has the right mindset and recommended flight time for this. Perhaps someone more senior with more flight hours."

There was a murmuring in the room. "Seems like a simple flight to me; a quick drop into orbit, land on the planet and then take off. He wouldn't even have to worry about adverse atmospheric conditions since the planet has no atmosphere to speak of."

"That is not entirely true, Chief. Our scientists suggest the planet does have a very basic layer of atmospheric gases clinging close to the surface, likely springing from some sort of thermal vents within the planet itself."

"And drag coefficient?"

There was a long pause, "Almost negligible sir."

"Be honest. For you this is not an issue of ability, but significance. Any pilot worth their wings could make this flight with their eyes closed, but considering the press this is going to get, and considering all the important people who have opted to come on the mission you are finding it difficult to let him on board. It's an easy flight and it will help him get his hours in, not to mention that it is his turn in the rotation."

"You seem invested in this kid."

"Because I know he can fly."

The lieutenant stepped back from his wall eyes wide with excitement, disbelief and pride. He stood there in the middle of the service corridor for a long moment just staring at the far wall, dizzy and overwhelmed.

"Where is that kid anyway?"

Realizing that he was nearly late, he leaped into action nearly clobbering himself on an exposed pipe before making it to the service door and out into the hallway, half running, half staggering up the corridor in a panic. He got a few strange stares from uniformed officers passing in the other direction. Finally, he made it. He scanned the dermal implant and the door opened to reveal all eyes trained on him, and a couple mouths open as if ready to speak.

He grimaced at his sudden and obviously awkward entrance before scooting to the side with his head down, apologizing quietly for being late. He found himself standing near Chief Palmer who rested a hand on his shoulder. He looked up, green eyes to brown eyes, watching as the man's brows narrowed with a stern expression.

Chief Palmer leaned in close, voice low as he whispered, "I wasn't aware you had administrative access to the service tunnels."

Vir blanched, but received only a chuckle from the chief, "Don't make me regret this. I went to bat so you could be on this mission. This is more than a once in a lifetime opportunity. The biggest honor ever"

He nodded vigorously, "Yes, Sir I ... ur what's so special about this mission?"

He was graced with a withering look. "Good lord, boy! I thought you were smart enough to figure it out."

Lieutenant Vir blinked owlishly, his brain having suddenly slowed down to a crawl, "I.... urrr."

Chief Palmer sighed, "Proxima B, the big ass exoplanet we came here to explore. The second biggest space event since Armstrong walked on the moon. THAT big mission."

"You're not serious!"

He quickly regretted his little outburst as it drew the attention of the room at large. He lowered his voice to a hoarse whisper and with some difficulty croaked, "You're serious?"

Chief Palmer looked him over with a sigh that turned into a smile, "Very, now compose yourself, Captain Kelly should be here any second."

He wasn't wrong. A moment later the door hissed open and the captain stepped into the room. She was dressed today in her pristine grey UNSC uniform, complete with captain's cap which she had tucked under one arm. Everyone stood as she walked through the door but she waved them off.

"Sit down," she barked, "Let's get down to business... Proxima B." She waved her hand over the table at the center of the room and a hologram leaped out at her bidding, rendering the planet in striking 3D detail before their eyes as the lights dimmed.

"I have been speaking with mission control back on Earth and we agree that the time is optimal for this mission, which they have dubbed Forerunner. We've mapped out a proper flight plan for our entry and selected a landing zone. With our extensive mapping of the planet over the past few orbiting cycles, we have determined the best place of landing to be right here." She indicated a place on the realistic hologram.

"Right in the penumbra of the terminator, the surface temperature is estimated to be roughly -39 degrees Celsius, a right balmy temperature for exploring, high enough that life is theoretically possible, though without the presence of an atmosphere it is highly unlikely. We will set down here along this ridgeline between the ice field and the rocky plateau, an area which we are lovingly calling the Apollo zone, that way we can collect samples from both the stone and the ice in a single mission. Now, considering the historical importance of what we are about to do, this mission will be heavily monitored by the bridge back on the ship and mission control back on Earth. Every person will be evaluated before, after and during for any psychological or physiological anomalies. Also, due to the nature of what we are about to do, some of our mission is likely going to be televised to the general public, most likely from launch, to landing, to the first step onto Proxima B. As Captain, I would very much like to be that person, but if you have any arguments for someone who would be better suited, I will hear them now."

There were no dissenters among the crew. Sure it would be pretty awesome to be the first person to step foot on another world, but that honor belonged to the captain, the handpicked landing crew were just pleased to have been chosen.

The lieutenant could feel his hands and feet tingling with anticipation. He bounced in excitement on the balls of his feet not believing his luck, it almost didn't seem real. Then a hand clapped down on his shoulder pressing him into the floor. He turned his head embarrassed and tried to contain himself as she continued.

"Finally, I need to submit to mission control our roster for this mission: the captain, chief science officer plus science team, makes five, geologist, microbiologist and two lab technicians. In addition, we have one engineer, and Chief Palmer are you flying or have you selected a pilot?"

"We've decided to stick with the rotation ma'am. Lieutenant Vir will be piloting the shuttle on this mission. I will co-pilot."

The lieutenant felt the full weight of her gaze descend on him, and as usual could feel a blush began to creep across his neck and face.

"Lieutenant, you think you can get us to our destination?"

"Yes, ma'am though...well..."

The entire room turned to eye him again and he silently cursed his speak before think problem.

"Well what?"

"Well, I was just wondering why you opted for an angled entry. The planet has no observable atmosphere, so we don't have to worry about burning up or skipping off. That two-degree corridor is much easier to deal with when...well, when the corridor is about 360 degrees of free entry. I could drop in from the top or take us in laterally. If I drop us into the gravity well and let that carry us all the way down, I guarantee it would be faster."

There was a pause around the room, "Can we do that?" The Captain glanced at Chief Palmer for verification.

"These flight plans were made when we assumed the planet did have an atmosphere, but the kid is right, if there is no measurable atmosphere then there are options as to the kind of entry we take."

"Arguably, I would say the same even if there was an atmosphere." Again, everyone turned to look at him in surprise and confusion. He shuffled his feet, "Angled entry is an obsolete technique used when they were still trying to conserve rocket fuel, and thrusters were fixed. With full rotation and fusion engines, I can slow us down manually for entry at any angle you would like. A lot of people still rely on it as a crutch considering proper orbital speed or just the rate of movement in space, but without the issue of fuel and rotated engines I can drop into the gravity well and use rear thrusters to reduce speed, thus reducing the probability of us burning up in atmosphere to zero." Was he talking too much? He was definitely beginning to think that he was talking too much.

A small smile crossed the Captain's face, "Well I suppose we can just go ahead and let the pilot, pilot." She swiped her hand over the hologram causing it to vanish and then crossed her arms over her chest.

"Our mission roster is set. We will call this into mission control and prepare for the mission. The shuttle crew is already preparing the ship, but it may take a little longer to prepare us for flight. Again, I cannot stress how important this mission is going to be. The amount of times I have said that phrase, we might as well make it our crew slogan, but you get the picture." She jabbed a finger at the Lieutenant and then the other auxiliary crewmembers, "You report directly to DECOM. The rest of us will join you shortly."

-

Please place all personal items in the lockers to your right before entering the decontamination field.

"Remember, when you step into the first DECOM chamber you will want to hold your breath and hold your arms out to both sides. Please make sure to close your eyes, the first mist will last only ten seconds." The Decom officer continued his barrage of instructions as he stood next to the lieutenant cataloguing every item he removed before placing it in the locker. He unzipped the front of the flight suit.

"Please remove everything from the pockets."

The lieutenant fumbled for a second, shuffling around in his pockets before coming back with the stupid protein bar.

The man eyed him, "Have you eaten today?"

"Yes sir, I just wasn't as hungry as usual."

"You feeling alright?"

The lieutenant shuffled nervously, "Yes sir, of course sir. I might have eaten more, but I spent too much time talking. I'm fit for duty."

The DECOM officer held up the bar, "Then why didn't you finish this?"

Lieutenant Vir made a face at him, "Because it tastes like ass."

He raised an eyebrow, "You have a lot of experience with the taste of ass, lieutenant?"

The man seemed very amused at the response he received from the young pilot, which involved a lot of stammering and blushing, "I well.... no ... I mean it... I imagine that that's what ass tastes like ... n -not that I tend to imagine the taste of ass a lot, I mean at all. I'm not weird like that I-"

Laughing, the man slapped him on the shoulder, "Calm down, Kid, I'm just messing with you. I hate those things too, tastes like the slime you find on the bottom of a dumpster, and yes I actually do know what that tastes like, so don't ask." He motioned for the rest of his personal items, which he handed over. His bare feet were cold on the metal as he was ushered into the next room.

"Eyes closed, feet shoulder width, hands held out to the side, hold your breath at the end of the countdown."

Decom in 3... .2... 1

He cringed as a fine mist of cold showered his body and face, causing an eruption of goosebumps over his skin. Little balls of condensation grouped together in colonies of glittering diamond on his cheeks and face. He could even feel a few of them clinging to his eyelashes.

Please remain standing.

He opened an eye, blinking away the droplets of antimicrobial spray, but was immediately blasted with a cold gust of wind. He attempted to hold back the moan of agony as the cold bit into his body causing blood to retreat into his core, turning the pale skin of his hands and feet a mottled purple. He thought he resembled a corpse. The air warmed up a little the longer it went on and with a sharp pressure change, the air ceased.

Please proceed

A door at the far side of the little plastic tent slid open and he stepped into the next room where he was provided with a comfortable, sterile robe. It wasn't much on the warmth factor, but it was better than nothing. From there they proceeded into the next room where medical Decom officers stood in full-body Tyvek suits and respirators. There were seven tables laid out with prepared space suits and medical instruments.

"You the Pilot?"

He turned to look at the suited stranger, his voice warped heavily by the face mask separating them.

"Yes sir."

"Come this way and take a seat." Vir did as told, pleased to find a heating vent below the chair to warm his freezing feet.

"Alright Lieutenant, have you worn a space suit before?"

He shook his head but then kind of nodded, "Sort of, sir. I've worn the translunar paired model a couple of times, but those were never meant to see the outside of a spacecraft, of course I did training for these but...." He glanced over at the table, "I think these are a different model."

The man nodded, "These aren't so different from the ones you may have trained in, just a few more layers. They are a lot sleeker than the older models. They were designed by a private company which sold the gear to the UN, probably some of the best equipment any military unit has ever worn. But before we do that, we are just going to go over your vitals and set up a monitoring system if that's ok with you."

Vir nodded eagerly, "Yes sir, whatever you need."

The Decom medical officer motioned for an assistant who quickly applied horribly cold sticky gel to plaster little EKG monitoring patches to the upper part of his chest. The patches were small and wireless, so they didn't bother him after a minute. They took his blood pressure, temperature and oxygen levels, all of which they were pleased with.

"Good, good," the man muttered to himself.

"Tell me lieutenant, have you been experiencing any light headedness, nausea, fever, headaches, trouble urinating, constipation or any physical ailments we should be aware of?"

"No, sir"

"Last time you were ill?"

"I had a bit of a cold three or four months before the launch, nothing since then, just a bit of discomfort from some of the food, but I'd hardly count that."

The man chuckled and moved on, "Haven't we all."

Captain Kelly and Chief Palmer stepped in around the same time, both looking cold though they were wrapped in the same sterilized robes as the rest of the exploration party. Kelly began speaking with their science officer as soon as she sat down.

As it turned out, the preparation for this mission had been going on for some days now. Talks with mission control on Earth had plotted, planned and simulated their mission from beginning to end weeks in advance. The rest of the science crew had been readying themselves with extra testing, and time within the suits to familiarize themselves.

It seemed as if they weren't too worried about the ability of a career pilot, to, you know, pilot, and he hadn't been forced to join any of the earlier tedious debriefings and training sessions.

"Ok, I think we can start gearing up, how about you?"

He nodded, growing excited or nervous, it was hard to tell which.

"First things first," the Decom officer reached over and picked up a dark blue suit that resembled a goofy set of footie pajamas with a hood and gloves, or maybe a morph suit would have been a better description, "cotton synthetic weave, with attached coolant system, padding and biomonitoring. Just slip this on."

The lieutenant took it from the man's hands, unzipped the suit and carefully placed one of his legs inside. It took some wriggling and dancing about to get it up around his waist, where he discarded the robe and struggled to thread his arms into the sleeves. This reminded him of putting on a wetsuit, just as snug but with more mobility.

The rest of the crew were in similar stages of readiness. If this wasn't such a serious matter, Vir might have laughed out loud at the grownups looking like toddlers trying to dress themselves. Getting the thing zipped was easier as he was assisted by one of the DECOM nurses. He managed the padded hood all by himself. There was a soft beep as the suit connected with his implant.

"How does that feel? Got enough movement?"

He shrugged and then hopped up onto the chair to test it. The guy seemed surprised at his behavior as did the rest of the party, but he gave them a thumbs up. "It's good." The lieutenant noticed a symphony of eye rolling to his antics but didn't much care as he climbed down.

"Touch your thumb to all your fingers, lift your arms up over your head, now bend down and touch your toes," the DECOM officer turned toward the vital monitoring screen which had started giving them real time updates. "Now for the uncomfortable bit."

"What uncomfortable bit?"

"You aren't gonna like it."

"What are you-" Vir figured it out a moment later; gasping sharply, eyes widening he nearly ran himself into the table legs he was shaking so bad from the discomfort.

"Yeah, no one likes the auto insert catheter, but if we had told you beforehand you would have tensed up and it would have been worse. Also, astronauts used to wear diapers so count yourself lucky."

Vir grimaced and sat back down.

"Ah none of that boy, now for the fun part." Vir got to his feet before being led over to the wall and asked to stand on a plate with his arms out and feet apart. The others had taken similar positions.

"Please stay as still as you can." A button clicked.

Beginning auto-scan.

The room was suddenly filled with a hundred green lights then just as quickly they vanished.

Initiating auto outfitting procedures.

A sudden fervent whir combined with the reverberations of machines and unexpectedly, the walls around him sprung to life. Robotic arms reached out, securing hardened plates to the body suit, beginning with the feet and moving upwards. He couldn't stop grinning.

"Holy shit, I feel like Master Chief... or- or Iron Man."

The DECOM officer did not get the reference.

Chest and back plates were fused together with a neck plate, and then all of that was topped with the heavier steel around the chest, shoulders, arms and legs, open only at the joints to give them mobility. He was handed the helmet last and was helped to secure it in place with a light snap. He was suddenly surrounded by his own breath, hot and humid but somehow, he managed to avoid fogging up the visor which was open like a motorcycle helmet. He could move his head with a slight decrease in mobility and flexing his hands he found them to be surprisingly dexterous.

He stepped down from the plate and headed towards a mirror in the far corner of the room. The suits were color coded for ease. His was a dark navy blue with an orange tinted visor. The captain's was silver while the support crew was in black.

"Pretty sweet isn't it? A few things before I let you go. The suit is largely self-sustainable with self-cleaning filters and an oxygen system that can recycle air indefinitely. Hopefully you won't have to test that out. Here on your back you have a canister. Press this button and it will release the gas from the back plate allowing you to propel yourself forward. It won't do much good on land unless you have engaged this device, perhaps the most expensive piece of equipment we own. It's the GFG, gravity field generator. If you press the dial this way it will adjust to earth gravity and if you adjust this way you get a zero G field. Don't play around with it too much because it could malfunction, and we wouldn't want that. Sound good?"

His first response came out as a squeak he was so excited. He had to clear his throat to drop back into normal human register of hearing, "Yes, sir."

In the next moment he nearly jumped out of his skin as his implant buzzed with the Captain's voice, "Alright, let's hurry up and get that picture for the press. I've got better things to do with my time." All of this came over the comm because hearing anything through the helmet was near impossible. The captain ordered them into an orderly group for the picture. As always, he ended up in the back as tall as he was. In front of him was Captain Kelly who was a good six or seven inches shorter than he was. He hoped that the glare from the overhead lights would cast a shadow over the inevitable stupid grin on his face. He couldn't wipe it off with steel wool if he tried. He could imagine it now, some stoic badass picture for the history books and him in the back grinning like the Cheshire cat on whatever kind of drugs the author had been smoking when he wrote the book.

There was a bright snap momentarily blinding him and the group broke away from each other.

"Ready?"

The Forerunner crew cheered, a certain lieutenant most enthusiastically before they were lead to the far door which was thankfully thrown open without any drama or fanfare. Stepping out into the chamber sent his heart racing, and he had trouble keeping himself steady. Chief Palmer walked next to him, looking out past the walls of the decontaminated airlock to where crewmembers were waiting with cameras, taking the first pics of the mission that would be transmitted back to earth. Behind them, one of the auxiliary crew members had fallen back, adjusting a shoulder mounted camera.

The shuttle was before them now. Vir's breathing stopped momentarily. Compared to their space cruiser, she was a sleek and impressive. They had had quite a few years to perfect this one, so it fit with the aesthetic of their space suits. As they approached, one of the aircraft attendants, wearing a Decom clean suit, lifted the hatch for them.

To his surprise, the lieutenant was motioned to enter first, ducking into the shuttle through the open airlock. Noises originating outside the suit were distant and muffled, including the thudding of his shoes on the metal flooring below. He ducked into the cabin, bypassing a stockpile of secured crates which contained canisters and packaging for the samples they were expecting to bring back to the ship, before walking up the aisle between the crew seats, which faced each other like they would in a troop transport helicopter.

Vir ducked through the next little section, sliding himself into place in the pilot's seat. He turned his head as Chief Palmer took a seat beside him , settling in with the rustling of his suit against the seat. The others filed in, closely followed by the technicians who moved through the cabin, helping the crew members tighten their harnesses, all five-points.

Vir jerked in his seat a bit as the shoulder straps were pulled even tighter across his suit.

It was then that he realized he would have to do the preflight without the comfort of his checklist. He didn't need it, but it was a familiar routine that kept him focused.

Static in his ear.

"The clip on your left." He glanced to his left, pleased to find a laminated ring of cards containing the preflight booklet. He gave Chief Palmer the OK signal, completely forgetting that he had a headset literally stitched into his skin.

Reaching out, Vir powered up the flight computer and communications array, linking them directly to his headset.

"Enterprise this is Forerunner, beginning preflight sequence, do you copy?"

There was a long pause in which he heard others speaking quietly behind him. The crewmember with the camera was leaning forward, and he thought he could hear the man speaking, though distantly. Opening his comm channel to the rest of the crew, he was able to hear the chatter but dialed it down so he could begin his check.

"This is the Forerunner mission crew. In the cockpit we have Lieutenant Adam Vir as acting pilot and Chief Jackson Palmer as the copilot. Heading the mission is Captain Tala Kelly-"

"Good morning Forerunner, this is mission control, hope you don't mind us stepping in."

The lieutenant blinked in surprise but felt a grin spreading over his face, "Not a bit mission control. Permission to begin preflight sequence."

"Preflight is go."

"Powering navigation array, checking radar.... Are all nonessential personnel out of the cabin?"

"Yes, lieutenant."

"Closing airlock doors," he felt more than heard the whoosh as the doors closed behind him.

"Closing cabin doors," another soft whoosh that ran through the ship.

"Pressurizing outer chamber," more clicking and a sharp hiss.

"Pressurizing inner cabin," he barely even felt the change except through his seat.

"Cabin and airlock pressure holding steady, preparing first stage ignition of the rear engines."

This time he could hear the rumbling even through his helmet as the ship began to vibrate and quake.

"Mission control, can I get a transfer for that route trajectory, though be advised we may take an alternate route to destination."

"Copy that Forerunner."

He glanced down at the flight computer, "Beginning first stage ignition on the lateral thrusters."

"Final check of your harness systems." Vir couldn't hear much of what was going on behind him at that moment but felt the harness system engage as he was again tugged backwards just a bit.

"Navigation locked, cabin contained, engines holding stable. Request initiation of primary ignition"

"Primary ignition is a go Forerunner, countdown beginning in ten..."

He didn't need to wait ten seconds as the engines were ready, but this was just so damn cool that he wasn't about to point that out. Maybe this was just for effect or to delight in the event that was about to occur. His hands flexed around the controls and he was thankful for the moisture absorbing fabric contained in his gloves. His heart was hammering inside his chest and the world around him seemed to go silent.

"Depressurizing main airlock," came a synthetic voice over his comms.

This time he felt the whomp as the entire ship shuddered , sudden, exposure to vacuum conditions making the metal of the ship groan. His stomach churned and with arrogant annoyance that familiar tingling sensation was back. The one that had plagued him for literal years at times like this.

How was that fair?

He ignored it and took a deep breath.

"Opening airlock doors," he didn't hear a sound this time, but instead watched as the outer airlock doors began to slowly slide apart. Light spilled in through the opening and the visor of his helmet darkened, dimming the blinding red light as it cut across the docking bay and up towards the ship.

As the light filled the bay, a massive body silhouetted against the light of the star became more evident. Bloody red light spilled over the front of his suit, over his face mask and over the controls where his hands held steady.

"Three.... two ... one.... ignition."

He flicked his thumb over the ignition switch, feeling the power of the engines as they engaged, vibrations rolling throughout the cabin as they lifted off the deck, barely using a fraction of output power.

He eased the stick forward and was immediately thrust back into his seat by the power of acceleration. Metal floors, metal walls, and blood red shadows and light flew by as they exited the aperture and were spat out into space against a field of stars and a massive planet looming in orbit below them. The dark, glorious, and immense planet filled the void before them, ringed in a halo of fiery red light.

He felt a release of his body as the tug of artificial gravity lessened and then died away.

He was immediately struck by the silence, the vastness and the wonder of it all. Behind them, their ship receded into the distance. The horizon of the planet curved below them as their orbit followed a predictable trajectory in synchronized orbit. Light from the distant red dwarf cut over the horizon and crashed as waves across the rocks, launching flaming light into the air to be deflected out into space.

"Mission control we are go for low planetary orbit."

"Copy Forerunner. We advise a double orbit instead of taking it on the first pass."

Vir glanced at the flight computer watching as their target approached.

"That will not be necessary mission control. Target approaching, we are tracking same with faster course trajectory."

"A cautionary approach is advised lieutenant."

"Noted, proceeding with caution mission control. Taking her in nice and easy. Don't have to worry about the entry window since there is no atmosphere." His hands were light on the controls, feet steady on the pedals as the planet grew larger and larger in his vision. It was almost possible to forget how fast they were going if you didn't take the scale of the planet into account.

"Would you look at that," someone muttered over the comms as the red dwarf broke over Proxima B's horizon, sending beams of ethereal light shooting in all directions. The stars they had been able to see earlier vanished, leaving only the glowing red light of the star to light their way. Slowly the planet started to reveal a surface plastered with both rock and ice.

"Beginning initial descent into the gravity well."

Despite his focus on the course and safely piloting the crew, Adam felt the warm rush of a familiar sensation as light from the red star continued to wash over his body, caressing his face and warming him on the inside. That feeling deep in his chest, experienced only a few times in his life and only ever while suspended in the vacuum of space. Glory and joy but manifest as a physical sensation which careened down his throat, filling his insides with liquid fire, a fire that spread through all the nerves in his body, into his hands, and into his face, vibrating along the fibers of his tear ducts.

Inside his helmet, his dreams reflected over the clear cornea of his eye, obscuring the forest green of his iris with the rocky hills and valleys of the planet below. Red light dripped from his eyelashes and onto his cheeks rolling in great waves down his skin. This feeling wasn't found in a church, a laboratory, a temple, at an altar and no other reality could replicate it. This was a moment carried to him on a wave of dreams, hard work and chance, and yet he was less than a ripple on the surface of a raindrop.

And just like that rain, the ship dropped from the sky, reflecting the red light of the adjacent dwarf star carried down into the gravity well on the wake of humanity's greatest achievements. Yet unlike a raindrop, their descent was controlled and slow with the firing of their engines. He watched calmly as their acceleration gage slowly climbed upwards. The ground below them was giving way to distinct yet slight hills, valleys and craters leaping out in sharp contrast against the unforgiving fire of their neighboring star.

In the seat beside him, Chief Palmer seemed transfixed by the view but was carefully watching Vir's actions. He looked concerned by their speed, but no admonition was necessary as the Lieutenant fired the vertical thrusters, slowly adding power against the gravity pull.

"Gravity field approximately 1.1 ratio to that of Earth, adjusting to counter gravitational acceleration," Vir stated, reaching forward to flip switches on the dashboard. "Altitude reading 100 kilometers and closing." He surveyed the flight computer, checking the vector lines for their landing site, "Please look out your right window at three o'clock, closing fast you will see the Apollo Zone, famous for never having had human contact but that is about to change."

He grinned as the comm shut off, but Chief Palmer shot him a look, a warning.

"Mission control, this is Forerunner beginning our final descent towards the Apollo Landing Zone, deploying landing gear and engaging forward thrusters."

"Forerunner be advised the planet's gravity is 1.1 that of Earth, engage gravity fields if necessary but avoid if possible. You will each feel twenty pounds heavier," The crew indicated their understanding.

Lieutenant Vir absently held his tongue between his teeth as he manoeuvred the craft towards the rocky surface of the planet, gouged with valleys of stone and great lakes of glacial ice. The rays from the red sun poured over the alien planet in a surreal or comic book aspect.

"One hundred meters and closing, 50, 40..." his hands gripped tightly about the stick as the rocky terrain rose up to meet them, "20 meters." He stopped the play-by-play giving the ship one last boost, slowing just enough that when they landed it was nothing more than a gentle kiss of metal on stone.

"Mission control this is Forerunner... we have landed. I repeat, we have landed."

A cheer rose up from the main cabin but echoed in his headset as he reached forward to kill the engines which whirred and died, rendering the cabin raucous and celebratory with whooping and cheers.

A hand clapped him on the shoulder and shook him vigorously as he grinned an ivory-tower grin as he stared out at an alien world.

"Someone will have to stay with the ship."

The lieutenant's smile fell just slightly as he sunk into his seat. That was the pilot's job. He tried not to let it get to him, it was ok. He was on the planet and no one could argue that. He wouldn't be put off just because he couldn't go outside, he was where he had always dreamed of going. Most people never even left earth, so who was he to complain.

"Lieutenant, what the hell are you doing?" He glanced at the Chief's outburst.

"What?"

"Get your ass in gear and go with them. I can stay here and hold the fort."

Vir paused, eyes wide in consternation and shock, "But... I.... you."

"Kid, shut up, just shut up or I will make you stay. We will be here long enough that you and I can alternate who stays with the ship. Now go."

Those words had him fumbling at the restraints, barely able to undo them as he scrambled from his seat, half forgetting the gravity exchange. He stood there awkwardly looking down at the other man who was gazing out over the front of the ship. The lieutenant paused but couldn't help himself, so he threw his arms around the older man in an enthusiastic embrace. He could hardly feel anything through the space suit, but he did feel the surprise.

He was glad his visor was down as he blinked, frantically trying to staunch the moisture that was beginning to build.

He was waved off. "Pilot's don't go all mushy," but the lieutenant heard the smile in the chief's voice. "Come on, let's go make history."

Together the two of them scrambled into the airlock where the rest of the crew was standing and waiting. The door shut behind them, sealing and locking with a hiss.

"Ready? We are going live in three, two, one."

Everyone went quiet.

The camera man had wriggled forward to get a better view of the captain as she stood before the outer airlock door. In her sharp silver uniform, she turned to face them and despite her voice being strong it was quite breathless. Her voice through the comms was the only sound.

"This is it. We, the crew of Forerunner, have landed on Proxima B. For a month we have been locked in her orbit, examining her terrain and mapping her surface. Proxima B, like our moon, is tidally locked with her star meaning that one side always faces the light. We have landed at the terminator's edge, the shadow line where day passes into night. It is currently -39 degrees Celsius outside and well, sunny. I don't know if you caught any footage from our descent, but she's rock and ice. It will be our goal today to take samples and determine if she ever supported life. Now that everyone is briefed, it is time to depressurize the airlock, and take our first big step."

There was a nervous shifting about the airlock as she reached out and pulled the latch. What sound there had been was suddenly sucked away leaving them enveloped in complete silence.

Captain Kelly stepped forward pushing the hatch with one hand while simultaneously pressing against it with her shoulder. In silent anticipation they watched as the door cracked, a sliver of thin crimson light spilled into the compartment almost like a laser. She forced the door open a bit further, activating the automated stair system which assessed the distance and positioned itself accordingly.

They watched impatiently and with awe as she braced herself against the doorway and stepped onto the first step.

"I suppose it's customary at this point in time to say a few words. Neil Armstrong said, 'One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.' Jesse Hadrick continued the image as he stepped onto Mars saying –' last time we did this mankind took a leap, now we take a bound.' If I were one for poetic words, I might say, on this step it's time for man to sprout wings and fly, but what I really want to say is.... Well, Armstrong and Hadrick can eat their hearts out," and then she stepped, bypassing the last two stairs and landing feet first on Proxima B.

And there she stood, feet apart, hands on hips, rimmed by the fiery light of a forever rising red star. The camera man captured one hesitant, yet triumphant step after the other, down the ladder and onto stone. He came to stand next to the captain who was staring at the unimaginable horizon of Proxima B.

Still bathed in red, standing atop the craggy brown stone of a small ridge, they looked over a descending valley of rifts and hills molded out of cracking stone and small patches of glittering ice huddled in the leeward side of the rocks. The unusual, muted light exposed the terrain as a strange, altered plane where the ice and stone were almost pink with its caress. The sky, though shining with the occasional star, was awash with a strange orange haze, the vestiges of an atmosphere having been blown away by the solar wind, creating the varying shades of orange, yellow, and gold which faded into the purple blackness of night. That same orange, pseudo atmospheric haze caused the distant land to fade into indistinct shapes, lost of all color except for orange marked with tendrils of long purple shadows which clawed across the landscape towards their feet and over the ship into the unknown.

Reaching down, the captain grabbed something strapped to the side of her thigh, unfolding it to reveal a long collapsible pole and the bright blue fabric of the UN flag. She stood there for an extended moment, still staring across the horizon before turning and plunging the flag into a crevice in the stone where it stood still and stiff, the banner parallel to the ground, a complimentary blue swash of color against a backdrop of brown and orange.

The rest of the crew filed slowly out of the ship, stepping one by one onto the planet's surface as if stepping into a religious sanctuary, all hushed and solemn for a moment.

"It's beautiful," cooed a longing voice.

Lieutenant Adam Vir paused at the doorway, hand resting against the hatch, staring on with child-like abandon at the scene before him: the distant orange hills, miles and miles of cracked undulating rock cut through with valleys and trenches where an unknown force had split it's surface, ice and rock blanketed in a red hue. In a daze, drunken with delight, he stepped onto the first step, his sense of excitement spurring him onwards.

But in his excitement, he must have hurried too fast. He realized too late that he had caught his foot as the beautiful, alien world spun and tilted around him as he stumbled forward. He momentarily wondered how it is that he could be doing the most awesome thing ever and still managed to make it look stupid. That thought was interrupted by the impact which jarred him through his suit from the contact of his elbows and knees against the alien rock.

A warning beeped somewhere in his suit.

"Lieutenant, we have been alerted to a four-point impact on your suit, are you alright?"

He grunted in pain and embarrassment as he pushed himself to a kneeling position, 'Well, Captain Kelly may have been the first one to step on Proxima B, but I call being the first one to have ever eat it on Proxima B." It was either feel embarrassed or make a joke, at least the camera hadn't been facing in his direction during his graceful disembarking. He quickly scrambled to his feet, aware that only one or two others of the crew had noticed. Forgetting about his earlier mishap, he looked down at the red warmed stone, shadowed with frost and marveled at the ground he had just encountered.

Captain Kelly had had her moment and though she wanted nothing more than to explore like the rest of them, she knew she had to get back to work. She motioned for the camera operator and made a cutting gesture with her hand. He did as ordered and cut the camera feed for a moment.

"Your job is to fully document everything that we see here. The rest of you have your orders and know your jobs: start collecting samples, taking data and readings and-" she stopped abruptly head tilting slightly to the side in an expression of consternation, "Remember when I said to document everything...."

"Yes, Captain."

"Do not document whatever that is because I do not want it to be part of my legacy." The cameraman turned and then froze in place head also tilted as he tried to determine what he was seeing. Clearly it was their young pilot but whether he was dancing or performing a strange hedonistic ritual he could not say. Whatever it was involved dancing around like a jackass, arms waving in the air. Whatever it was, it made him and pretty much everyone else who saw it smile. Perhaps they all just really wanted to join in, but the kid was the only one without enough sense or maybe with enough abandon.

In fact, working with the young lieutenant was like wrangling a puppy; first he was over here and then he was over there, and then he had returned. He had figured out the camera on his suit faster than the rest of the crew. The camera was attached to the end of the hand, and the image was projected inside the helmet for better viewing.

They caught him taking dorky pictures of himself on more than one occasion. At one point, Captain Kelly gave the lieutenant a stern look and a warning, but anyone watching close enough could see that she wasn't really trying to curb his excitement. It was easy to forget where they were when work was to be done, but it was hard to forget the exciting nature of their reality when the kid didn't. Overhead, the star never seemed to move in the sky, and except for the lights of their orbiting spacecraft, most of the stars were too dim to see.

This was it, the first time any humans had ever walked on a planet outside their solar system. They were just removing crates from the shuttle when one of the scientists turned to find the boy leaning over and reaching down to pick up a rock.

"HEY! Keep your hands to yourself!" One of the scientists barked, slapping the boy's hand away before he could make contact with the stone.

The kid looked up in surprise, "Wh-"

"No, no why! There will be no tampering with the landscape, you hear me?"

He glanced towards the flag, "But-"

"There will be no buts either and no taking souvenirs or contaminating the samples with fibers from your gloves."

"But-."

"Do I need to make you fold your arms so you don't touch anything?"

"I-"

He got a bit closer, "Behave yourself lieutenant, or I will put you in timeout aboard the ship, you got it?"

He slouched a bit, "Yes, sir."

With a sigh the man patted his back and turned around to unload the crates. The lieutenant turned in his place to stare down over the landscape, face split with a smile. A space rock would have been pretty cool, but it's not like he needed it to remember this experience. He engaged the heads-up display on the inside of his helmet scrolling through the pictures he had taken.

These would be proof of his presence enough.

He probably had the best selfie in the history of taking pictures of one's self.

Not to brag or anything.


	24. Chapter 24

The humans brain's ability to identify tone and pitch is so accurate, that they have been known to match and reproduce the resonant frequency of glass causing it to shatter, using only their voices. 

-

"Crew of the Harbinger, this is your captain speaking. We will be coming out of warp in approximately ten minutes. Please secure any and all loose items before fastening yourself. Dr. Krill, please report to the bridge."

Dr. Krill did not want to report to the bridge. He would be happy remaining here in his office away from the dreadfulness of the humans. He had been here for almost two megacycles which he now had an understanding of. He had been here for two 'days' and four 'hours,' a day being the amount of time it took their planet Earth to do one full rotation around its axis. A day was made up of 24 of their time measurements called hours, and already he was very much done.

He had done what he was expected to do. He had gone to the medical bay early on that first morning, and had immediately and repeatedly been perplexed and disturbed by all the appalling things that humans did, said, and thought which resulted in their needing Krill's assistance in the medical bay.

Whatever Krill had been expecting, this was not it. Dr. Krill had never really experienced confusion in his life. The Vrul were very pragmatic, careful and logical creatures, and considering his own genius, he had never struggled with understanding anything, but this, this was entirely different. Every waking moment was a puzzle, every second was a new and illogical action made by a human, and every hour he was being bombarded with new and abnormal medical facts. There was no pattern, there was no logical sense. He had read their journals and books on abnormal psychology and Krill believed all humans should be put into this category.

The human body was one disaster after another that somehow made it vulnerable and invulnerable at the same time. Humans could survive brain damage, but their organs could also spontaneously fail. There was so much chaos in human medicine that Krill had a hard time reconciling that with everything he understood about medicine.

He knew he was making vast assumptions with his still limited knowledge, and his lack of understanding was slowly getting to him. Perhaps humans would make more sense when he understood more about them, but even that was difficult. Krill had been studying the human language and reading the medical journals in his spare time, but even though he understood the syntax, grammar and a vast quantity of vocabulary, he was finding that Earth had multiple languages and this 'English' to have more exceptions than actual rules. Not only that, but even in this analytical medical literature, Krill was finding what he designated 'humanisms,' or strange semantic sayings that were absolutely confusing.

It turns out, he needed not only a dictionary when trying to read the medical journals, but he also needed a human; however, that was a lose-lose situation in which either he didn't have a human and he didn't understand what he was reading or he did have a human who understood, but in the explanation there arose more questions. Besides, even though the humans claimed they were not into eating aliens, he still had his doubts. Krill was having a hard time accepting humans as a non-threatening predatory species.

He hadn't gained the courage to go into the human 'mess hall' again and watch the humans eat, since he was more than afraid of what he would find when he did. Just thinking about the warm slimy orifice full of teeth made him sick. Species other than the Vrul had teeth, but they were dull and large, while the humans had sharp bones erupting from their flesh that they used to tear other creatures apart like it was no big deal. Of all the species currently known to the GA, humans were the only sentient predator species. At this current moment, GA members were either plant based, or herbivores. It frightened Krill to think of what else the GA had yet to uncover.

Krill had been so eager for knowledge and maybe adventure that he had ignored the inherent hazards. He was stuck here officially and completely. There was no exit strategy, there was no escape despite how much he wished to do so. He would have to console himself with further scientific study. He had a job and even though it had the potential to kill him, he would not return in dishonor. Perhaps he would learn how to thrive in the human environment without ending up dead inside a week, seven days, apparently.

Gathering his courage, what little of it he knew there was since the Vrul did not consider courage to be a desirable trait, he composed himself and made his way towards the door, allowing the lights behind him to fade into blackness.

The halls outside were empty of humans as they readied themselves to come out of warp, and Krill was eager to follow their example. If going into warp had been bad, then coming out of warp was sure to be just as horrible. As close as the administration deck was to the command deck, he found his way to the bridge in less than a few minutes, stepping in just in time to hear the captain conversing with one of the bridge personnel.

"Ready, captain?"

"We wait for the doctor. It's generally considered rude to unfold space when someone has the potential to bash their head in."

"I am here," Krill announced, trying to keep the shakiness out of his voice as the group of humans turned to look down at him as he scuttled across the deck.

The human flashed his teeth at him in response, "It's good to see you doctor. It feels like I haven't seen you in a while."

"A day and 3 hours," Krill interjected, strapping himself into a seat to prepare himself for what was sure to be a horrible ride. Space travel with the GA was not nearly so uncomfortable or petrifying. Looking up, Krill found the human staring at him.

He shifted nervously "What?"

"You've been counting?"

"You weren't?"

The human shook his head slowly, "Not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing, but either way-" he turned his head back to the front, motioning towards a human who sat at the 'navigation' station. "Prepare to exit warp."

She nodded as the Captain initiated the intercom "This is your last warning; we prepare for exit in ten...nine." He cut off the comms just then, probably assuming that the other humans would be smart enough to figure out what he meant, though he continued to count quietly to himself. The human at the navigation station waited on him, her hand over the switch.

His hand dropped to one.

Krill closed his eyes.

"Disengage!"

To his surprise, the doctor found that coming out of warp was unexpectedly more pleasant than going in. If you could call anything which made your insides feel as if they were about to drop out, pleasant. Krill jerked forward in the harness before being forcibly thrust back into his seat at the sudden deceleration.

"Blast shields!" the Captain ordered.

As the shields opened, a splinter of light began to filter into the room. Krill looked on in concern and fascination. For the first time he wondered where the humans were taking him. He thought about the planet that these creatures must have come from and cringed at the thought. What kind of planet could have spawned such hellish creatures? In his head he was imagining battle fields, constant chaos and ire, the land littered with pits of bones and streams of blood. He hoped he was exaggerating a predatory planet. He was letting his imagination get away with him, which was odd considering the Vrul were not particularly imaginative. Ever since stepping foot on the human ship, Krill was finding the changes in himself harder and harder to ignore. Changes that he did not quite know how to explain or combat but were becoming evident none-the-less.

Ahead, that splinter of light had turned into a crack which slowly blossomed into a long pillar vertically cutting the center of the room and falling upon the captain, where he sat in the command chair. The humans initially looked away from the unaccustomed, natural light, though Krill kept his eyes forward as the blast shields continued to open, giving them an unencumbered view of their destination. Krill closed his eyes, allowing the distant starlight to caress his skin, a warm yellow light spanning a cold distance over millions of miles. No longer did the unending darkness of space seem so cold.

"Will you look at that," the human muttered, and Krill opened his eyes to see the captain standing, hands on hips at the front of the deck, staring out the window and towards what Krill just noticed. A massive red world was silhouetted against the blackness of space. Bands of peach, red and tan swirled over its surface in great sweeping arcs that were enfolded by black. He unbuckled himself hesitantly and went to join the human.

He had only ever seen two planets in his life. The one on which he had been born, and the one on which he had worked. Both of those had been rocky worlds where life had managed to spawn, but this, this must have been a gas giant with its symphony of swirling colors and textures all struggling for a home in the violence and blackness of space.

"Welcome to the Milky Way, Doctor," the human announced, his head nodding towards the great red orb whose reflected light spilled over his face and reflected in the green bands of his irises, "and say hello to Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system." He pointed out the window, "See that red spot right there. That is a massive storm on the planet's surface, approximately four times the diameter of my home planet, and from our records it has been raging for more than 966 years. As far as we know, Jupiter has not been without a large red storm for more than a few centuries at a time. It could be seen from our planet in the 16th century, well before humans had managed flight."

"Humans were looking at space before they could fly?" Krill wondered.

The human laughed, "humans have been interested in space since we first looked into heaven and saw the stars looking back." Vir crossed his arms over his chest and sighed staring out at the planet, "I know we're close to home, but no matter how much time I spend in space, the view never gets old."

Krill wasn't entirely sure he agreed, but let the human have his moment.

He supposed it was a pretty awe inspiring view, objectively. The massive gas giant was a thousand times larger than his own planet, so large that if it had gotten much bigger it could have gone and been a star, but instead, there it was, hanging in the silent blackness, staring outwards at the distant warmth of its mother star, trapped in constant orbit.

The captain returned to his seat, "Engaging manual controls." he announced, causing Krill a mite bit of panic as he rushed back to his seat.

He shouldn't have worried though. If the human was proving one thing about himself, it was his ability to manually pilot a spacecraft, a spacecraft which he now controlled with dexterous ease through the blackness. Ahead of them, the bright red and peach orb grew larger and larger until it took up most of their visual field outside the ship.

"Careful Captain," one of the crew quietly cautioned, "We don't want to fall into her gravity well."

"Don't worry Lieutenant, we will stay as far away from that possibility as we can."

Krill watched as bands of red and tan slowly swirled past them. He could see individual tendrils of gas and wind now. They must have been massive in order to reach way out here.

"Europa Station, this is the U.N.S.S Harbinger requesting permission to dock."

Krill watched as a small pinpoint of white appeared against the large planet's red surface. It was glassy and smooth, hanging in Jupiter's orbit like a condensed dewdrop on a stalk of grass. Krill watched as they drew closer, the moon replacing the view of the massive gas giant. Bright white, the orb was only slightly discolored by a dusting of brown with massive surface cracks that ran for miles over its surface like a muddled spider web. Despite this, the moon seemed relatively smooth, lacking many of the pockmark's associated with damage from meteorites and space debris.

The red light that irradiated from Jupiter was now replaced with the white reflection from the ice on the moon's surface.

"Copy Harbinger, please follow the orbital path to docking bay 2."

"Entering orbit now," the human announced.

While the ship tracked to its destination Krill observed the glassy surface, trying to make out the lines of cracks in the ice by way of ambient light which drifted in from the universe. As it was, the moon Europa blocked out light from the nearby star and so cast the light of countless stars into sharp relief against the inky background of space.

"Open comms link to the station directory," the captain ordered.

Light began to spill around the side of the planet as the moon fell beneath them, Krill watching in silent awe and fascination as the star slowly began to appear.

"This is Commander Adam Vir of the U.N.S.S Harbinger requesting an appointment with the administrator of this station."

The star had now designated the horizon, casting the marbled surface of the moon below them into shadow. Krill turned his head to glance at the human who was perched on his tall chair, one elbow resting against an arm rest and one foot bouncing lightly against one of the footrests. He tapped his fingers idly on the other armrest.

Krill had noticed this strange human characteristic: they seemed incapable of being still. Talking especially caused them to move around; their shoulders shaking from side to side, their hands leaping about in theatrics, their eyes darting, their head in constant motion. But even when they appeared still, their legs bounced, they rocked gently, they rubbed their hands over their legs and arms. What purpose could that hold? A soothing mechanism, perhaps. A predatory disposition?

"Your appointment has been granted. Particulars will follow."

Krill glanced out the window again, finding that the horizon had been broken up by the silhouette of a strange yet massive metal structure. From what he could see, it was generally circular in shape, a rough-flat disk which featured many protrusions. Light from the distant star cut across the intervening space and adhered to the sharp metal protrusions giving the structure a skeletal appearance. The closer the ship advanced, the more apparent the stark ugliness of the erection touted it as human construction. No other species created architectural disasters like this. Humans did not apply beauty to the practical, but in blatant contrast to it.

Blunt and crude, the Europa space station was indeed similar to a disk, which appeared to be the central hub. Long arms branched out, connecting the inner hub to an outer ring which spun slowly even as the doctor watched. Small specks of white flew in, through, and around the outside of the large metal ring, some of them dipping down towards the face of the moon and her glassy surface.

They were approaching quicker than the doctor would have liked, but just as he was thinking that, the Captain adjusted the controls and the ship slowed as it approached closer and closer to Europa Station.

"Bay 2 clear, please proceed to dock," a distant voice instructed.

"Proceeding to dock," the captain repeated slowing the ship even more and bringing the massive hulking behemoth gently into a slow glide.

The station loomed over them now, a massive catastrophe of metal in a haphazard shape that rose above their ship like a menacing hunter. Staring at it, Krill couldn't help but think of the resources that had gone into building this monstrosity. It was huge, and formidable in all its slate grey glory. The captain adjusted the controls once again and eased the ship closer to a set of open bay doors. Krill cringed as the captain managed to slide the ship through the opening and then dock it, gently, almost lovingly inside the airlock.

"Cut engines," the captain ordered.

And with his order, the deep thrumming inside the ship went silent. The entire hull creaked as the ship settled on her struts crouching against the ground like some sort of metallic amphibian crouching on a stone.

The light spilling in from the open airlock was slowly disappearing as a massive set of doors closed behind them. The last sliver of light was snuffed out before bright red lights inside the bay began to flash. The hull of the ship snapped and popped as atmosphere flooded the airlock, and suddenly they could hear the rattling of the doors, and the distant mechanical sounds of the station rattling up through the ship.

The captain reached down and engaged the comm, "Crew of the Harbinger, this is your Captain speaking. We have successfully docked at the Europa Station, and may be here for a day or more while we run diagnostics, resupply and debrief. You are free to leave the ship during our stay, but if you do not return to the ship when ordered you will be left behind and treated as a deserter. A few other quick reminders: behave yourselves, don't cause any trouble, do not operate any heavy machinery while inebriated, don't get pregnant, don't get anyone pregnant, do not cause any fights, disturbances, riots or revolutions, don't sell your body for money, and-" he smiled a bit, "Don't have too much fun, this is a military operation after all, out."

He disengaged the comm and turned around in his seat just as the far doors were beginning to open. There was a distinct whirr and then a thud, and their ship began to move. Krill watched nervously as they were brought around through another set of open doors and into an absolutely massive docking bay. It was so large that it made the ships docked there look like toys. Their ship, however, was the largest in the bay, causing the people below them to appear nothing more than tiny insects against the massive slate floor.

The captain stood from his chair, and only now did Krill notice that he had deviated from his usual wardrobe. The clothing he wore was a slate grey color, leaning more towards white than it did towards black. It was buttoned up on either side, and rode high up onto the neck. There was a belt wrapped tight around his waist, above his hips and over the jacket. Little pins glittered in silver on his shoulders and collar. The shoes he wore were dark grey, but still far from black, and as Krill watched, the captain pulled some sort of head covering from under his arm and placed it smartly atop his skull.

"What are you wearing?" Krill questioned, his curiosity getting the better of him.

The captain stepped down from the dais where his chair was positioned. "A uniform," the Captain answered as he touched the head piece, "and this is a hat, or captain's cap. I am assuming your species would have no use and cannot wear hats."

"What is it for?"

"Humans use uniforms to signify rank in an organization's hierarchy," he pointed to the uniform, "this denotes I am a member of the UNSC." Vir motioned to the hat, "and this lets them know I am an officer." He tapped on one of the silver pins, "This represents my rank as a Captain. The whole uniform indicates position and profession, or quite simply your pecking order." He flashed his teeth, "Plus it also makes you look badass, and..." he lowered his voice, "most people find other people in uniform to be quite attractive."

Krill frowned at that thought, but he supposed it made sense. An individual in 'uniform' would have status and importance, and in the human hierarchy that was particularly important, not to mention that a uniform might imply care for one's appearance and physical health. Krill wasn't entirely sure if his observations were accurate, but it seemed to him that when humans were sick, generally the first thing to go was their self-care.

The captain turned to address another human in uniform.

"Lieutenant, please check the list to see if all departments have submitted their requests. I want you to get that list down to the requisitions office, and then supervise when it's ready to be loaded onto the ship. I have to meet with the station's administrator, and then see if I can't requisition myself a new eye. Depending on how long that takes we may be here a while, but just in case we aren't, I want you to ensure that everything is packed and ready. This stop was not scheduled, and I want to be back to work as soon as possible."

"Yes, sir.... um, sir."

"Yes Lieutenant?"

The woman rubbed the back of her neck with an open palm, greatly confused about something, "Well...er...sir, I was checking the requisitions' manifest and there are a few unconventional-"

He held up a hand, "Just make sure everything is on the ship. I promise, there is a very good reason for those requests."

She paused, her mouth opening and closing in confusion before letting it drop, "Very well, sir."

"Good," he smiled and nodded before making his way towards the door, "Come on doctor."

Nervously, Krill scuttled across the floor at the man's heels as he made his way down the hall, "What was that all about?"

"What was what all about?"

"The issue with the requisition?'

The man simply waved a hand, "it wasn't an issue, it was a nonissue. I simply requested a few things that are a bit unorthodox, but will hopefully preserve crew morale, so I decided, why not try and see if my idea works."

Krill didn't inquire any further; he was curious, but cautious, engrossed with his surroundings. As they walked, the ship slowly shook itself awake until the halls were absolutely swarming with humans, some wearing uniforms, some in what he had come to recognize was regular clothing, and all of them intent to get off the ship and onto the behemoth station. The thought of the station made Krill shudder with excitement or fear, he wasn't sure as he was still trying to puzzle out all the new emotions the humans elicited from him. He had seen outside the ship's windows, had watched hundreds of small specks swarming all over, and he knew, he knew he had walked from a human den into a human hive. The humans here had been cordial and nonthreatening towards him, but there was no guarantee that things were going to stay that way. The captain was the first human Krill had encountered and from what he understood, he was the first Vrul or alien many of these humans would encounter. He didn't want fear or ignorance to incite negative actions towards him.

"Europa Station is primarily a military installation," the Captain was saying, "construction began more than two decades ago, but after we encountered intelligent life, the project received a sudden boost in funding. As a military installation it is first of its kind, and will help the construction of what we are calling the NEXUS: a peripheral monitoring system spread across the solar system that will detect any alien presence, and/or space debris that could be hazardous to our species or our planet. It was easier to put the station here because of the established pumping stations on Europa's surface. The station is so big that it would have been impossible to build her planet-side, so she was constructed in orbit using metal deposits mined from the asteroid field. In fact, 98% of the station was built from outsourced material mined and harvested in space."

He pressed a button to close the elevator doors, and Krill felt a sudden drop in his innards as they started down.

They stepped out onto the disembarking level a moment later, "The station has been operational for less than a year, and as you saw they are still completing construction."

The doctor paused nervously, "The station isn't even complete yet?"

"Relax doctor, all of the finishing touches are cosmetic and external, the inside of the ship is more than safe."

They had reached the cargo bay, and together they walked towards the open ramp leading down into the docking station. Large vehicles were waiting to speed off in random directions with their cargo while humans wearing bright orange vests supervised the chaos. Krill and the Captain trooped down the ramp and onto the open floor.

As he glanced around, Krill was impressed by the scale of things: the towering ceiling, the immense ships, and the length of the bay which terminated at a spot where the humans looked like specs.

The second thing that struck him, and which rooted him in place, was the humans themselves. He had always known that compared to the Vrul, humans were a physically diverse species, but he hadn't known it extended to such a degree. There were humans here of different colors, shapes and sizes and varying physical features. Their epidermal layer ranged from porcelain, cream, ruddy, olive, bronze, copper, to ebony. What a kaleidoscope of color! Some humans had long hair, some had short hair, and some had no hair at all. In height they ranged from those who were not much taller than Krill to those that towered at almost seven feet tall. If you looked at some you could almost see the entire structure of their skeletons through their skin, while others were bloated and ballooned from massive deposits of fat, fluid or muscle. He was unsure.

The captain had paused, allowing Krill the time to observe and ruminate.

They were just so different. It was hard to comprehend they were all the same species.

"Pretty great, isn't it?"

Krill wasn't entirely sure he felt the same way. Was it rude to ask if they were sure they all derived from the same species? It was just so hard to reconcile the extreme differences within their species.

Krill was brought out of his pondering when a hand dropped onto his back and began steering him across the open floor. The captain guided Krill into the heart of the madness, which swelled up around them in a cacophony of sound: the roar of engines, the clattering of feet, the thud of machinery, and that ever present chattering of human voices raised over the clamor of the room. Large rolling machines roared past them and towards the end of the docking bay.

It was all quite fascinating until he realized there were thousands of eyes upon him. Literally thousands of eyes were trained on him, some wide, some narrowed, some nervous and others curious. Everywhere they went eyes followed them, and in some cases the people themselves followed, barely noticing the captain except for his proximity to Krill. The weight of the watching eyes was so intense Krill could feel a physical load on his frame.

Above him, the Captain didn't seem to have noticed.

A group of uniformed humans took pause upon seeing the captain and reacted in a way Krill had not seen before. They stopped abruptly and suddenly snapped into pillars of rigid bone. Their arms raised till their hands were almost touching the temples of their heads, eyes staring forward despite their previous gawking.

The Captain paused and returned the gesture allowing the group to continue on their way. Of course, they chose not to continue, instead staring after the pair as they moved up the bay.

"What was that?" Krill whispered.

"A formal greeting among military personnel."

Krill considered the importance that humans placed on social hierarchy. Of course the Vrul had a strict hierarchical society, starting with birth status which determined intelligence, occupation and productivity. The Vrul's societal structure was logical and rigid. It made sense. The Alphas of his species would always retain the premier hierarchical position than the other classes because they were smarter and so were more useful for the survival of their species. This didn't seem the case for humans. The captain was not the biggest, the strongest, oldest, most experienced, and certainly not the smartest. His place in the social hierarchy was a mystery that Krill was having a hard time puzzling out. Hierarchy was not based on intelligence, intelligence was not based on birth order, and so what use, worth or desirability did the Captain provide?

Their system seemed so completely flawed and capricious that Krill wondered at the humans' ability to maintain a productive society.

Still reeling from the idea of such an arbitrary hierarchical structure, Krill barely noticed when they reached the end of the docking bay. He did, however, notice when the human at his side stopped and suddenly grew very stiff. Krill looked up in time to see the human making the same gesture which he had been made to him earlier and turned to find a peculiar looking human approaching them from down the bay line.

The human had clearly been conversing with another group of humans before the Captain's appearance and dismissed them curtly before making his way over.

He was of average height for a human with olive skin, and brown eyes. However, his hair came in a color that Krill had never seen before, an almost silver grey, the color of steel with a sheen of white. He was wearing a uniform similar to the Captain's except there were three silver symbols stitched to his uniform instead of the single silver pin on the Captain's uniform.

When the new human looked at Krill, Krill was shocked by the negative intensity of the man's scrutiny. The expression he wore made it very clear that he disproved of Krill's presence, and so spent a long while staring at Kroll's Face, mouth dropped into a frown while examining Krill up and down like he would something distasteful stuck to the bottom of his shoe. He then turned his attention back to the captain, one silver eyebrow raising as he looked at him. Krill felt like there was an unspoken challenge or animosity as the men squared off for an extended period before the man deigned to speak.

"At ease, Captain."

The captain dropped his hand, "Admiral," he held out a hand, "it's an honor."

The Admiral took the offered hand, and the two of them held it for a moment before letting go, "And to you as well, Captain." Krill watched very closely and very curiously. He had seen that gesture a few times and knew it as a greeting, but couldn't have said in what context it was supposed to be used, since he had seen it on multiple occasions.

"Before we continue Captain, I have a few quick inquiries for you," the admiral began, letting his gaze pass between the two of them before trailing down the line of ships to where the Harbinger crouched, brooding next to the far wall.

"Yes sir?"

He pointed towards Krill, "First question, what in the hell is that?"

If Krill understood the question properly he knew he should take offense.

The captain stiffened in response, "He is one of the reasons I am here, Sir."

The man frowned, making it clear he was not particularly pleased with the other man's explanation which was lacking in specificity. "Second question," he paused, "why are you wearing an eye patch?"

This time the captain looked almost rueful, "That sir, is the second reason I am here."

With an expression of dissatisfaction, the Admiral turned away from the captain and back at Krill. The eyes were cold and looking into them Krill got the sudden and immense sense of looming danger. He didn't know how to describe the feeling fully. But this human, this human was dangerous, and it would be wise to tread cautiously.

"Tell me about 'it'."

With a steadying breath, the captain clasped his hands behind his back, "The two stories are related sir. The short version is, there was an unexpected incident aboard the ship that resulted in the loss of my eye-"

This seemed to surprise the Admiral who turned to look at the captain with a rubbery face marred with deep wrinkles about the eyes and a turned down mouth. "You're telling me not six months into your mission and you have already gone and lost an eye? How does that even happen?"

The captain motioned them towards the hall, and the two fell into step. Krill watched them in quiet concern, keeping back and to the side of the captain as if to keep as far away from the admiral as possible. "We were making repairs on the maintenance deck, and I had stopped by to inquire after the situation. I wanted to know what was happening with my ship. I stepped in at one point to assist one of our engineers who was having trouble with a piece of equipment, this involved positioning myself on a ladder. Everything was fine until we experienced an unexpected power surge. I ended up falling from the ladder and," he motioned towards his eye, "the result was deep penetrating trauma to my right orbital socket which destroyed the optic nerve but left no brain damage."

Krill watched in fascination as the admiral flinched at the thought, the corner of his mouth pulling up in a grimace. It was a strange reaction considering he had not seen the accident, nor felt the pain that was involved, but still he acted as if he had seen or experienced it.

"It was a sudden accident that could not have been helped. Luckily we were close to an intergalactic trade hub which housed the alien version of a level 1 trauma center." The captain motioned to Krill just then, who shrunk back a little further, "Doctor Krill, a Vrul, performed the surgery. As you know, the Vrul are highly intelligent and train their entire lives for a single profession. Based on his expertise, he was able to remove the object without causing further damage, which was already miraculously minimal. The eye patch was a gift from members of the crew. Additionally, alien technology has not advanced into the arena of prosthetics, so the eye patch was prudent."

"And what is he still doing aboard your ship?"

Krill knew his position and the captain's decision was being challenged, and he was very much willing to hear the arguments. Why was he here? The admiral had a perfectly valid question, thank you very much, strange grey human. Krill had been asking himself the same questions since moments after he boarded the human's ship.

"Doctor Krill is, according to the GA, the most accomplished medical professional in the galaxy. I took some liberties and invited him aboard my ship to further knowledge and goodwill between our species and to replace our old medical officer who...."

"Who up and quit in a rage so profound I haven't stopped hearing about it for the past three months." The Admiral grunted, leading them around a bend in the hallway and through a set of doors into another long corridor. If Krill had thought the ship was busy, the station was downright swarming, though this little observation didn't stop him from noting the turn in the conversation.

The last officer had quit...in a rage?

Together they made their way through another set of doors sidestepping a column of humans making their way down the hall. It seemed as if they stood there forever, as the column just kept coming. And Krill had thought the ship had a lot of humans.

"It's a big job sir, and it was simply a product of extreme stress for which not everyone is equipped."

"Extreme stress brought on by an extremely stressful job," the admiral continued, "I wonder what could make a doctor so extremely stressed after having survived medical school, surgical residency, and owning his own practice that he would have a near psychotic break and threaten the UNSC with litigation in order to vacate his contract."

"I know," Krill announced.

The captain narrowed his eyes, "That was a rhetorical question, doctor."

The admiral held up a hand, "No, no captain, I am interested in what the bug has to say."

Bug?

Their conversation was cut off for a moment as they were forced into a tight stairwell, and down another hallway which terminated at an automatic door which hissed open bringing them into a small but neat office with a desk and two chairs. The captain and Krill paused before the desk as the Admiral cut around the other side, motioning towards the chairs with his hand as he took a seat.

Once settled he looked to Krill, "Go on...Doctor."

Krill shifted nervously in place. He had not intended to start a conversation with this human but it seemed that he had jumped into this hole by himself and was going to have to float his way back out. "Human medicine is horrific. I have been aboard the ship for a very short time but I can see that humans are prone to injury and disease. Your species is for now a mystery since apparently a screwdriver through the eye is not an indicator of great danger. Maybe the uncertainty causes excessive stress." There was a pause as the admiral looked down as his fingers were tapping against the other arm in a measuring sort of way. He didn't seem convinced of Krill's explanation. Krill surmised there was more to this story than he currently knew.

The Admiral turned his head back to the captain, "Captain, I should start an inquiry as to why the UNSC awarded a boy barely older than a frat pledge a ship and command of a 500-person crew. A boy who can't keep all of his limbs and organs intact. I should be asking why they trust you so much when there are more qualified applicants for the job. Luckily for you, the GA likes you because this just proves to me you are not fit for command. You lost an eye so what makes you think they will allow you to continue flying?"

Carefully watching the expressions on both the Captain's face and the admiral's, the doctor noted changes in expression and body posture in the younger human, a slight tightening around the lips, a stiffness in the shoulders, and a hand that wandered towards his prosthetic leg.

"Sir, you just answered your own question. The GA trusts me, and based on my history during Operation Steel Eye, you know more than most that losing limbs has nothing to do with job performance," a subtle eye flicked down at the captain's leg.

Krill continued to observe and study the men and the situation.

The confrontation sent one man into sullen silence and moved the other into tight-jaw stiffness. This was a new side of humanity he had not yet seen. This was certainly a side of the captain he had not yet seen. There was no joking here, no frivolity. There was, instead, a stiff subtly. Observing the human's body language, he noted a novel mannerism. The humans were directly facing each other, an antagonistic gesture he had never seen performed by humans before. Usually humans faced each other at an angle, refusing the more direct approach, but now they were facing each other directly. It was a subtle change, but Krill felt as if the room had grown cold. It made him very uncomfortable, not only because he sensed something was wrong but also because it was something he didn't understand.

For a long moment he wondered if the humans would physically attack one another, but the captain shifted in his seat, redirecting his knees until they were facing the far corner, breaking the face-off and reverting into an angled posture.

"Sir, I came to request that the doctor be allowed to remain aboard my ship. He would be an excellent asset, and in accordance with my orders would foster good will and alliances in the galaxy. An alien on board would allow the GA and our species to gain much more knowledge and insight."

Krill shifted in his place as the grey haired human turned his cold eyes upon him. He had his hands clasped on the desk in front of him thumbs rubbing gently over each other.

"Captain, I am pleased that you approached me with this matter even though control of your crew is ultimately up to you. I can see why you consider this a necessity. I have no qualms with your decision and request but will have to speak with my superiors." Krill could actually feel the tension dissipating. He couldn't tell how the humans felt about each other, but at least he wasn't having to worry about imminent death on either of their parts.

"Do I have your permission to requisition a new eye?"

The admiral nodded, "Permission granted, Captain-" he paused, holding up a hand, "Just try not to lose...anything else."

"Yes, sir," the captain said standing from his seat as did the admiral, "I was thinking the same thing."

The two men shook hands again.

"There is one thing I would like you to do before leaving, Captain."

"Of course Sir, what?"

The Admiral turned away to face the far wall exposing his open back to them. Krill wondered if it was some sort of power play or was the admiral finally comfortable with their presence. "I want you to report to administration before your departure to give a full debrief. I am sure everyone wants to know what has transpired during your first few months of deployment."

"Yes, sir. I will report as soon as possible."

"You are dismissed," the admiral's voice trailed away a bit towards the end as he stared thoughtfully at a mounted image behind his desk. His head was in the way so Krill couldn't see exactly what it was and didn't have the chance to figure it out as he was ushered hurriedly out of the room and down a set of corridors before finally being allowed to stop, The captain took a deep breath and leaned heavily against a side wall.

He rested his hand against the cold steel and took a few calming breaths, his hand reaching down to rub at his prosthetic leg. "That could have been better, but it also could have been much worse."

Krill looked on in confusion, "You... do not get along?"

The captain remained where he was. "There were a lot of people who weren't pleased with the UNSC's decision to make me captain of the ship: too young, too dumb, too rash; all of which I get. It makes sense. But some people are still bitter about it," he continued to rub his leg, "and they don't mind poking where it hurts."

"And you got all that from...that conversation?"

The captain looked at him, "Subtext doctor, a large portion of human interaction and communication is actually non-verbal as there are certain contexts in which it is important to keep your real thoughts to yourself." Krill grew very nervous upon hearing that. How was he ever supposed to learn to properly communicate with a human if you not only had to listen, but you had to watch too? How much was he missing when he talked with the humans? There could be entire sub contextual conversations occurring and there would be no way for him to know.

"H... how does one learn to recognize these things?" Krill's voice was quivering slightly.

The Captain shrugged at him, "It depends, things are tricky and there are plenty of people who never figure it out."

Krill looked on in wonderment and in exasperation?

"You mean to tell me that your method of communication is so complex that not even your own species can understand it?"

The human smiled at him, "That sounds accurate. Anyway, we have to make one more stop before I go to get my eye fixed."

"And what is that?"

"We have to pick up a very, very special package."

Great, that could mean absolutely anything in context with this human, for all Krill knew they could be picking up a bag of the mysterious 'marshmallows' or they could be getting themselves a crate full of stolen organs. Krill felt that nothing was outside the realm of possibilities.

The human made a motion with his hand and Krill noted with pleasure that he was beginning to read human body language. His understanding was rudimentary of course and completely lacking in contextual understanding, but he understood this and that had to count for something.

His enthusiasm quickly died under the crushing weight of a thousand eyes which locked onto him as he made his way down the hall at the captain's heels. This anxiety was all too real.

He tried to appear undaunted by examining the architecture while trying to ignore the humans. What he noticed seemed standard for what he knew about their species. Everything was made for brutal functionality. Rectangles, squares and triangles were the primary building blocks of their world, and metal was their calling card. It made sense. These humans seemed reckless and brutish so their architecture would have to be sturdy in order to keep them contained.

The Captain had paused to use his sub dermal implants to navigate around the station. Krill speculated that the Captain was disoriented from a spontaneous outburst which derided the station for being an 'absolute Charlie Foxtrot' whatever that was supposed to mean.

They lost their way at least twice in a maze of corridors surrounded by strange and unfamiliar humans before the Captain burst into a joyous exclamation, "Ah, here we are! Finally!"

Krill did not perceive any difference in the landscape. Each bare wall and open room looked exactly like the last, and to him they may as well have been going in circles. At least that's what Krill thought until the walls around them opened up, and he found himself standing at the head of an enormous room with high ceilings, metal floors, hundreds of tables, hundreds of people, and an absolutely massive observation window. Krill couldn't help staring in awe at the slowly rotating view. Europa fit snugly in the left corner of the window, a glittering ball of ice in the vast emptiness of the vacuum, while on the right Jupiter was slowly spinning into frame: massive, red and towering, rimmed in a halo of light as their star began to recede behind its immense curvature.

Despite the magnificent view, only a few humans were looking out the observation window. Most had their attention on a close group, a single other human or even on the personal projections created by their sub dermal implants.

Krill, on the other hand, just couldn't turn his eyes away. His reason for staring was not entirely due to the view, though it was pretty magnificent. He had travelled through space and had seen many wondrous sights. His staring was based on the consequences of a random piece of space rock smashing into the window. They could all die horrifically with barely a second to register what had happened. The humans were not as practical and careful as the Vrul. They sacrificed pragmatism for magnificence. Where the Vrul were always logical and practical the humans were a mix and not a rational one.

He turned away quickly trying to push the thought out of his mind, with only minimal success. To appease himself, Krill concluded that there was probably a blast shield, like on the Harbinger, to avoid just such catastrophic situations. Even so, the thought was never far from the back of his mind.

A better distraction presented itself as a voice erupted just to the side of him, "HEY, THERE'S MY GOOD GIRL!"

Krill turned and knew immediately he was going to die.

He knew it soon as he spotted the monster racing towards them across the floor; dark eyes, wide and wild, mouth open to reveal horrifically long, pointed teeth, powerful body crouched low and towards the ground, a ravening beast that shot towards them across the floor.

Krill unexpectedly let out a high pitched keen of fear, never having been in danger so pressing and immediate. He threw himself backwards as the powerful, four legged monster tore towards them. It leaped, and Krill fell backwards, appendages covering his face in a futile attempt to protect himself. Falling back onto the floor, Krill expected pain of crushing jaws and powerful teeth sinking through his carapace and ripping him apart.

The fear ripped at his sanity and washed away his reality, in that single moment he knew he was going to die. Before closing his eyes, through a gap in his appendages, he watched as the beast launched at the Captain and slammed him into the metal deck with the clatter as the jaws of the creature opened wide to rip out his throat.

Krill shrieked again, wondering how it could end like this. Why was no one trying to kill the beast?

And that is when the sound came to him.

The sound snapped him out of his terror just long enough to look over. The short reprieve from horror was momentary. The fear burst through him again with the power of Jupiter's storms as he watched the animal viciously maul the captain's head and face while standing on his chest like a predator does before it disembowels its prey.

Krill instinctively snap into action and begin crawling backwards across the floor.

And then the sound came again. It was so strange and out of place. A high pitched whine that started and then cut off and then started again interspersed with loud gasps for air.

The creature was breathing in between mouthfuls of the Captain's flesh.

But.... No.

There was no blood.

And the human, now that Krill looked closer, was still moving legs kicking, hands trying to hold back the creature as it lunged towards his face. But despite the struggle, there was no blood.

Another sound came to him, cutting through his cloud of fear until he finally realized. The human was laughing. But wasn't that a good sound? Humans didn't tend to laugh when they were getting viciously attacked...did they?

The haze was beginning to dissipate, allowing reason and logic to set in.

The human lay on his back, twisting and struggling with hands held up in front of his face, but despite the melee he was laughing, and not a tense laughter, but uproarious laughter. The ravening beast, instead of tearing at the captain's flesh, was licking every inch of the man's exposed skin. Great white teeth flashed in its mouth not inches away from the human's throat and face, but still it contented itself with running its squishy pink sponge over the man's face.

That high pitched squealing noise was emanating from the creature, who hopped and wriggled, its tail waving furiously in the air behind it as it made a pseudo attack on the human.

"Stop! Stop!" More laughter arose from the captain between gasps of breath and shouts of command. "Ok, Ok! It's good to see you too girl. AH! Stop!" He tried to push the muscled creature from his body, but every time he did it just came back for more wriggling, squealing, licking and snorting. Eventually the human was able to push the creature from his chest and make it to a kneeling position, running his hands back and forth through the thick fur, grabbing great handfuls of it, especially along the shoulder and neck, rubbing his hands up and down stroking its massive ears.

The tail, covered in layers of mid-length hair whipped back and forth behind its body. As the human stroked its great velvety ears, the creature reared onto its back legs giving the human access to its creamy underbelly. The long pink tongue lolled from its mouth, breaths coming in short sporadic bursts that erupted from the chest to blow warm air onto the human's skin, "That's my good girl, yes you are, who's my pretty girl?"

The beast whined at him some more, stretching its neck out to reach his face, tongue darting out from between its pointed teeth.

The Captain pulled his head back laughing, "No more of that. We have done enough of that today."

Krill watched in stunned silence as the captain pulled the beast closer wrapping his arms around its fury powerful body rubbing one hand up and down it's hairy back, "I missed you girl."

The creature stuck her tongue in his ear for his troubles, and he pulled away laughing. The commotion was such a sight that Krill hadn't noticed when another human had approached from across the open floor. Only when the Captain stopped and began to speak did he notice the new arrival.

"Wow, she really missed you."

Krill looked up to find another human standing over them. She was a small specimen for a human, almost a foot shorter than the Captain, and immediately upon seeing her, Krill perceived that something was markedly different. Her mannerisms were typical for a human except her head did not follow movement, like as was characteristic. She stared straight ahead; her eyes were slightly shrunken in, and when he focused more closely, he could see that the orbs were rolling back and forth inside her head without any sign of directionality. And most notably, unlike the other humans, she was not staring at Krill. To his chagrin, he found that she too was not alone.

A beast, not dissimilar to the one who had attacked the Captain, sat at her side. It was a pleasant honey yellow in color, with long flowing fur, and ears that drooped slightly forward. The eyes were large and brown and as the human stood, the beast sat politely by her side tongue hanging out of its mouth. Over top of its buff fur it wore a brightly colored red vest.

It took Krill a moment to read the strange human runes blocked in large white patches on the side.

SERVICE DOG: DO NOT TOUCH.

The captain sat back on his heels still rubbing his hands through the first creature's fur, "Surprising to find you here, as you aren't one for the view."

The new human made a strange gesture by sticking its tongue out of its mouth. Krill had absolutely no idea what it was supposed to mean.

"Ha, ha, you're hilarious. At least I still have both of my legs," a strange sort of half smile tugged at the human's mouth, "besides, you are fifty percent on your way to becoming me.... cyclops."

The captain frowned, "How did you hear about that?"

A grin, "Word travels fast and I keep my ears open. How did you lose your eye?"

"Screwdriver...freak accident."

The human flinched in response...again with that strange behavior. As far as Krill could tell, nothing had attacked or harmed the human while they were talking so why would it flinch at the Captain's words?

Still smiling, the Captain turned his attention back to the beast. Stroking a hand over its large pointed ears he expressed his gratitude, "Again, thank you for taking care of her."

A hand waved at him dismissively, "Oh, stow the thanks. She's a delight and Benny likes the company anyway." She, at least Krill believed this human was a she, motioned down to the lounging creature, "Anyway, I have her medical release forms in my bag for you."

Off to his side, the beast had finally turned its attention to Krill and in fear he hastily stepped back. The other human's head turned slightly, "Who's your friend?"

The captain turned his head to look over at Krill, eyes widening a bit as if he had totally forgotten the little doctor was there, "Oh, sorry. Jenny, this is my new medical officer, Dr. Krill. Dr. Krill this is my friend Jenny. She agreed to watch my dog while I was away."

A dog?

"Hello," Krill ventured nervously.

The human tilted her head to the side, "Kinda short aren't you.... and the voice isn't...."

"Yeah, he's not human."

Shouldn't she have known that?

Her eyebrows jumped up, "Fascinating! You're my first alien."

Krill shifted nervously in place watching the human's expression. She had tilted her head slightly downwards, though her eyes stared past Krill, unseeing, "Is there something wrong with your eyes?" Krill ventured, "I'm a doctor," he finished haltingly.

The human grinned at him, "Blunt, isn't he? A breath of fresh air to be honest." She turned her head just a little to address Krill, "My eyes don't work. I can't see a thing. Blind as a bat."

Krill stared at her in consternation, "What... but," he stammered and glanced towards the captain, "Don't you have prosthetics?"

The human sighed, "Sadly my condition is congenital, and my family didn't have the resources to attempt to correct it early on. I tried a few procedures when I got older, but the process was experimental and physically stressful. I guess by that time my brain just couldn't handle the visual input, so I stopped, and now I am happily back to my old self."

Krill continued to stare... happily back to her old self? "Are there many humans like you?"

She shrugged, "Tons of us."

"And you... function normally?"

She grinned at him, "with a little bit of help." She pointed down at the dog, "Benny here is my guide dog. He gets me around in places when there are large crowds or a lot of noise, otherwise...." she tilted her head slightly back. What followed was a sharp snapping noise that echoed around them seeming to bounce across the floor and reverberate inside Krill's head. "When I'm in a quiet place, I am generally pretty good at echo location," her head swiveled to look down at Krill, and this time she was facing him properly.

Krill glanced at the captain, "I was not aware that your species could use echolocation."

He shrugged in response, "Generally, they can't. I can't. Cover my eyes and I'm liable to run myself into the nearest doorframe, but Jenny has been doing it since she was what... eight, ten?"

"Something like that."

"Yeah, so she's a pro."

"I run into less doorframes with echo location than Adam does while he had two working eyes."

Krill watched as the humans flashed their teeth and shrugged at the same time, "She's not wrong," he sighed, "and now I have half the number of eyes"

She laughed, "You're going to get a fancy new one that can see in infrared, how sorry I am for you. Let me just cry."

"Screw you."

"You wish."

"Not to interrupt-" Krill cut in, "but what exactly are those things?" During the entire conversation his eyes had rarely deviated from the furry monsters.

"Oh, these are dogs."

"A dog?"

"Yes," the captain began, "man's best friend."

"And woman's," piped in Jenny.

"A friend?"

The captain sighed, "For thousands of years humans have been able to take certain animal species and domesticate them or tame them. We bring them into our homes and our lives for our protection, companionship, assistance or employment. Over thousands of years we have taken animals and bred them to be as docile and affectionate towards us as possible. The wolf, the predecessor to the dog, was and still is an amazing pack predator. Thousands of years ago, humans made friends with these wild animals and over those years we have bred these animals for certain purposes. Now they love us more than most humans do." He patted his dog's head, and Krill stared on in apprehension.

If he had thought a human had exaggerated predatory traits, he stood in awe. This thing, this thing right here was the real deal. On all four feet he knew it could run faster than a human. It's wide dark eyes and large pupils faced forward, its set of interior teeth were enormous maybe half an inch long, whereas a human... well... humans were not the impressive predators he had first thought. Not to mention those massive ears which, unlike the humans, swiveled back and forth, lay down, sat up, and tipped forward.

And here the humans were cuddling them.

"So you keep a pack predator in your dwellings because - ?"

Jenny cut him off proudly, "A dog will always love you no matter what happens to be wrong with you, and dogs can be trained to be very useful. Both of these beauties were trained as service dogs. Benny leads me around, keeps me from running into things or people, he makes sure I can cross the road without getting run over, and he knows tons of commands to go and get me things when I need them." She pointed towards the other dog, a tawny yellow beast except for a large dark patch on its back, ears and muzzle, "Waffles, is a therapy dog."

The captain rubbed his hand through her ears, "And boy have I missed her. I had to leave her here because they had to clear her medically before allowing her around other lifeforms. Dogs can sometimes carry other diseases from humans, and we have no idea if they transmit between species, so better to be safe than sorry."

Krill stared at the dog, and the dog stared back. Its ears were pushed forward, and the little black patch of skin at the end of its face twitched as it sucked in short bursts of air.

Krill stepped back, "What is it doing?" he inquired.

Jenny laughed, "She's just smelling you. A dog has a nose almost forty times more powerful than our own, so powerful that they can be trained to detect certain diseases, changes in blood glucose, and even the presence of different types of hormones."

Krill stared at the animal.

The animal stared back.

"Here, hold out your hand and let her sniff you."

"No thank you. I can observe from here."

"Come on, if you do it now, she will recognize you as a friend, and you won't have to worry. I promise you won't get hurt."

Krill frowned at the Captain skeptically, "That thing could rip your spine out if it wanted to."

The human nodded but didn't stop smiling, "If she wanted to, she could. I trust her with my life and have hundreds of times. Come on Krill, this is part of scientific research."

Krill was going to refuse again, he had no intention of getting any closer to that animal, but the decision was made for him as Waffles stepped forward and began running her nose up and down his body snorting and sniffing the entire time. In response, Krill shrieked and held his arms out, holding perfectly still barely daring to look at her just in case she could sense his fear and attack.

The attack never came. Instead, the dog snorted dropped its head and began smelling the floor as she trotted back to Adam where she sat happily by his leg.

"You're not bringing that thing aboard the ship, are you?" Krill demanded.

The captain grinned at him.

"Of course I am."

Krill sighed, watching as the dog leaned down to lick its own leg, bright white teeth glittering in the overhead light.

Terrific, it didn't look sanitary or safe.


	25. Chapter 14

Humans do not require all of their organs to live. If necessary, a human can live without one kidney, a gallbladder, part of their liver, a lobe of a lung, half a brain, a reduced amount of bowl, and --given surgical intervention-- even more. 

It would, however, be unethical to try to determine the extend to which humans do not need organs. More case studies must be preformed

-

"Peace! Peace brothers and sisters, raise your voices, raise them now to the supreme spirits that dwell around us. Raise your voices to the sky, throw them low to the ground, and pray with me that the spirits may attend us in all our dealings. Pray that we may receive their power on the battlefield, for their swiftness, and their heat, pray for their strength, and their fires that we may conquer our enemies and slay them till their blood burns orange like the fire of the mountain. And lastly, pray for these, our brethren, that they may embody the spirits in all things that they may bring honor to the clan as the clan has brought honor to them."

Sparks erupted from the stone floor rising into the air on strings of smoke then scattering outwards in minute explosions like diminutive sun bursts or lava explosions.

"Come forth Drevlings, come forth and kneel before your forbearers that we may seal your place as warriors in this clan, with fire, with stone, and with water."

Spear shafts cracked against the ground, a symphony of war rising into the blackest recesses of the cathedral where the great spire of the Temple of the Four Warriors began. The clan of Omphalos gathered now, jammed beak to breastplate in the dark, shadowy hall. Smoke from the great central fire billowed about the room rising as a bluish haze that blotted out the blackness of the ceiling.

"Lift your weapons my brethren as we call upon the spirits to guide us. Let us pray for our children," the room filled with a cacophony of deep humming. It reverberated across the stone floor causing tendrils of fire to flick in the stone basin. At the head of the room, a shadowy figure stood, his cloak hanging in lifeless folds down his back vibrating only slightly with the power of their combined voices. "Pray, pray my brethren!" He thrust his hands up towards the citadel's concealed heights, and with it rose the power of a hundred voices rising into a great crescendo that broke over the obsidian glass in powerful, pulsing waves.

On the cold floor below him, a group of twenty Drev warriors knelt evenly spaced, ten in the circle on the left, and ten in the circle on the right; glittering like polished gems of obsidian, emerald, ruby, rose, auburn, gold, teal, and vibrant, electric blue. Ribbons of fire rolled above the group like flickering streamers of light waving above their carapaces, sending diamonds of color into a frenzy with the glimmering sparks.

The Magnate threw his head back as if possessed by the power of the humming, and with it went his hood, sliding off his head and draping over his shoulder. His wizened face was dark with age, and the carapace on his back was browned with the licking tongue of fire. All that remained of his youth were his penetrating golden eyes, now covered by lids pressed tight in rapture.

The humming was building again, racing high towards the ceiling, threatening to erupt like the power of the volcano, but just as it was reaching its peak, a voice cut through the darkness.

"Silence!"

The room was plunged into immediate quiet.

A figure stepped from the darkness, swathed in a dark robe. Pressed back against the far wall as she was, she was almost impossible to see but as she stood and made her way forward, she dropped her cloak to the ground.

A collective gasp rose up from around the chamber as Sentinel Prisma extended her upper arms to either side. Fire light leaped from the center basin, falling onto her shimmering white carapace and opalescent armor. On the ultraviolet spectrum, it seemed as if her body shifted and churned with every color imaginable, as if a thousand rainbows had been poured onto her skin and allowed to drip down her form.

There she stood, towering over most of her brethren, she was the embodiment of warlike grace, beauty, and power. Not a single eye strayed from her; some looking on in envy, others in desire, at the glorious color of her carapace, and the magnificent pearl armor which even now captured the reflection of a thousand tongues of fire.

"May your steel be sharp, and if you fall, may you fall in glory."

The assembled Drev raised their spears belting out their war cries until the stone sang with their blood-lust.

She raised her hand again quieting them, "Brothers and sisters of Omphalos. We have gathered here today to witness a glorious ascension. For years, we have toiled, taught and striven to bring our young ones to the precipice of war and today we gather to celebrate our success and the success of our young ones as they officially take up their weapons and don their armor." She swept her lower arms around in a great circle past the heads of the adolescent Drev, "Those you see before you today have more than proven themselves on the field of battle. Those you see before you have conquered their fears, completed their first kill, and have risen to the rank of foot soldier." Fire flickered and crackled in the center of the room, illuminating twenty hooded grey forms as they slipped fluidly into the shadow behind Prisma, pausing to wait for their moment.

"But at this time, let us take a moment to remember those who have fallen in battle; both the old, far past their years, and the young, too early to be considered soldiers. Yet, let us not despair, for they died in glorious battle in the service of their clansman, and so they walk willingly into the ether to await us at our glorious return to the spirits from whence we came." She bowed her head low to the floor, a ribbon of rainbow light trailing down either cheek, "Peace do we find in war, honor do we find in battle and glory do we find in death. The only dishonor is the unwillingness to give one's life for the clan, and may it so be remembered on this day that these young ones pledge themselves to our cause and so become warriors like their ancestors before them."

As her words finished rolling across the crowd, there was a great stirring, a ripple cast from the hooded acolytes who stepped quietly onto the obsidian glass floor. The room again went silent as the acolytes walked; their footsteps nearly silent on the gleaming floor beneath them. In their circles, the evenly spaced Drev adolescents kept their heads and bodies bowed.

The acolytes slowly moved behind the kneeling Drev, an acolyte for every youngling.

At once, they stopped, the towering dark and hooded figures loomed behind the young bodies.

In their hands, each of them carried a small wooden stool and a tray of implements balanced neatly atop.

Prisma raised her hands, "To always remind you of this solemn ceremony, you have one last covenant to make, and this contract will be set in carapace and in blood."

The stools were set down next to each of the young Drev.

The tools were removed.

"Take your places."

As one, the young Drevlings turned, bracing themselves against the stools, hunching forward so the carapace of their backs, arms, and hips were better exposed.

"Long ago the spirits bestowed on us a powerful, natural gift; one of armor, beautiful and strong, and today you seal that gift. With these cuts may you fiercely and purposely wear the armor of the clan for no weapon, no armor is effective until it becomes a part of you." When the Sentinel raised her hands, the gathering immediately reached a crescendo, humming with their powerful voices.

The acolytes moved forward, bending over the prostrate subjects.

In their hands metal flashed. No sound could be heard over the humming of the congregation as light cast from the spinning blades reflected on the exposed carapaces of their young subjects.

As they knelt with backs bent over their stools, the young Drev could feel the slight vibration in the air caused by the spinning blades, and they could hear it as it grew closer and closer to their exposed backs.

The humming noise did not cover the sharp grinding sound that followed. A cacophony of horrendous buzzing and churning sounded as blades bit deep into each carapace. Little flakes of color erupted from the spinning blades, dusting the ground with a chalky powder which illuminated like a rainbow in the firelight. It didn't take long before the carapace powder was replaced by flowing rivulets of orange, which dripped and streamed from the carapaces like lava leaks from a bleeding mountain.

Under the strain of great pain, bodies trembled and tensed, the Drevlings doing their best not to contort in agony, lest the blades slip deeper. Except, one Drevling was struggling more than the rest.

A small blue shape clung perfectly still to her pedestal, eyes closed as rivers of orange poured down her back and onto the stone. These tools had been built for thicker husks, and so had sunk deeper on her. The acolyte attempted to adjust the pressure, but the damage was done. Orange continued to spill from the blue carapace cutting trails down her back, and onto her quivering legs. The entire room continued to hum, though their eyes were fixated upon the scene unfolding before them. Blood trickled onto the ground in other parts of the circle, but on that one spot of obsidian floor it cascaded freely into puddles at the Drevling's feet.

In the crowd, a set of eyes looked on the Drevling in concern while another set turned away in shame.

Sunny held tight to her pedestal, biting back her voice and not daring to move. This was her chance; this was the day she would prove everyone wrong. This was her moment to prove them all wrong.

Blades spun and ground into each carapace one last time before stopping. The acolytes stepped back.

The blue Drevling's knees were weak, violently knocking together and shedding great drops of blood. With her eyes closed she could not see the blood, but she could feel it spilling down her legs, and dripping off her knees. There was a jolt in her left hip as the last blade bit down, and she groaned imperceptibly in pain. More heat spilled from her insides, but she would stay quiet.

And then everything stopped. She waited for the next blade to slice, but it never did.

She cracked a strained eye, looking up to find that the acolyte had stopped working and now stood over her, tools dripping blood. The rising hum in the cathedral chamber had died away, and she became horribly aware that all the eyes were pinned to her.

The air around her shifted, warped and cut through with lines of color. With difficulty she looked up to find the Sentinel standing over her.

No, this could not be happening. She didn't want this. She just wanted to be left alone for once, but it seemed as if she would never outrun the shame given her by the clan. She closed her eyes again hoping they would just let it go. If she died here, she resolved to die well. In death, she would not have to fight the continued shame of a thundered staring eyes.

A hand dropped carefully to her shoulder, "Perhaps we should finish this later."

Sunny felt her body grow hot with those words. Her stomach dropped down as if intent on crawling out through her feet. Her throat and chest constricted under the pain and the humiliation. Here she was, lying across this stool covered in her own blood and they were still judging, like they always did. They did not believe her strong enough.

Her limbs grew hot, and before she knew what she was doing she exclaimed, "Do not dishonor me with your ridicule. If I die, better dead than disgraced."

The entire room shifted in surprise.

Even the Sentinel showed surprise and silently pulled back. After some moments of heavy silence, the humming grew again, rising towards the ceiling. Sunny closed her eyes again unable to bear the thoughts that raced inside her head. Why today of all days did she have to fight for her right among the clan, had she not proven it enough?

Even thinking about the affront made her insides hurt. More than anything she wanted to sink through the floor, to mold time with her hands; anything to take her away from this place, but perhaps that was all well and good. The psychological pain made the ache in her body hurt much less, so she held onto that as the blades cut deeper into her armor slicing groves where her armor would soon be anchored. Thighs to shoulders, shoulders to forearms.

She was now kneeling in a pool of her own blood, she could feel it surrounding her knees, congealing and growing cold under the light of the fire, browning as it went dark.

And then it was done, the blade was pulled away, and she was left bleeding on the floor. She dare not crack an eye, right now she could not stomach their pity for her. Her survival so far had been based on luck or the sympathy of another. She had a warrior's heart, she could survive a battle, but in a duel, she was still no match. As of this day, she had never won, she never believed the possibility that she could, though she never stopped trying.

"Bring forth the armor."

It was at this time that members of the crowd stepped forward. Family members and close friends in the clan carrying pieces for their kin. At the very least they were four pieces of armor, and at the very most up to ten kin brought forward shiny protections of metal.

As for herself, Sunny waited. She was hoping for three shadows, but knew the truth when only two came.

She turned her head to the side looking to where her father Lumnus and her brother Cannon stood, their heads held high despite the scarce amount of armor they carried. In their arms they carried the adornments of a small child. Sunny was overcome with a sick sense of bitterness, and that bitterness grew into anger.

It was not fair, on the one day that she was supposed to feel pride in what she had accomplished, she felt nothing but an overwhelming sense of shame. It wasn't her fault, and she shouldn't have to feel this way.

Lying the armor down on the floor, her father Lumnus knelt next to her, covering himself in her blood as he did so. A hand rested on her shoulder.

"Do not be angry my young warrior. For you have proven to be far stronger and fiercer than many of these can dare to claim."

She did not believe him, but she appreciated his words.

Looking up, her older brother stood before her adorned in his armor, red carapace shining through in the fire, "You deserve every last piece," he whispered.

She was glad he thought so, though his words left her feeling empty. Because of everything that had happened in her life, she had heard those words more than enough. It would have been comforting if she thought she had deserved them, but deep inside she knew that she did not.

She had survived, yes; but that was not due to her own skill. She had managed to live, so had everyone else, she had managed to make a kill, so had everyone else; but she had never managed to win a duel while everyone else had. This thought made the words simply empty platitudes.

She would not wallow in this self-pity though. She was being realistic, not fatalistic. Realistic was knowing that while she had beaten the expectations of the clan, she would never change their minds about her. And so were her thoughts as the first piece of plate was slid into place, hard metal edges of the armor grinding against the raw slits cut in her carapace.

Blood seeped from the new wounds trickling out of the long slits and down her back to congeal in the growing puddle on the glistening floor below her, staining the cold obsidian with the orange of her blood. This was just the beginning of the ceremony.

The advancement ritual would be complete only after they had carefully washed their own blood from the armor, proving once and for all they were rightful members of the clan, capable of defending themselves and the clan. She would prove now her ability to maintain her weaponry.

Her father was placing the hip plates just now, while her brother worked on the shoulders and arms. The weight of the armor caused a terrible burning in her flesh, pressing as it was against the rawness of the wounds. She kept quiet. She would not look weak here, no matter the pain or the suffering.

After the last piece was placed, a hand slid softly under her chin, and she lifted her eyes to her father. In his upper hands he held the small silver helmet. And the way he looked at her made her feel that maybe, maybe she possessed worth and ability even if she could not see it.

He reached down, placing the warm metal over her brow, locking the defining piece quietly into place. Her father stepped away, rising to his feet to stand next to her brother who lifted his head in approval and admiration. Sunny felt the armor hugging her body, felt its familiar and comforting weight. It fit better than any armor she had worn before; the malformed training armor used by children, and despite being her size was not to her proportions.

This was different.

This felt good.

"Rise, rise my brothers and sisters and take up your weapons. Join the clan in unity for today is the day you walk into glorious battle with and for your clan. Today is the day that you bring honor to the spirits."

Sunny rose to her feet with the clattering of armor as all around her other young Drev rose to her feet. There they stood, the newest fighting members of the clan. A new generation of soldiers to conquer the battlefields, and bring prosperity to their people.

She turned to her side, making sure not to slip in the expanded puddle of her own blood and followed with the others as they spiraled out of the circle and made their way towards the doors, doors which opened to bathe them in a cascade of mid-morning sunlight. As the first feet stepped onto the cathedral steps a chorus of battle cries rose up around them, a hundred voices rising in unison towards the sky.

The new recruits stopped in awe on the cathedral steps, staring down onto the field where numerous soldiers gathered in their ranks, spears raised towards the sky, cheering for their newly accepted clansmen.

Despite herself, Sunny's eyes swept over the columns of soldiers searching for one warrior in particular.

It didn't take her long to find who she was looking for.

A tall, majestic silhouette of pure power and grace, the likes of which could not be matched but by the sentinel herself, General Cosma stood at the head of her army, glittering silver armor alight with sparks cast by the mid-morning sun. Her deep purple cloak whipped and snapped about her shoulders in a bright-season wind as her regal head turned to survey her new soldiers.

Cosma did not acknowledge her daughter.

Walking down the steps, the front lines of the army split like two massive, opening arms accepting the newest soldiers and enfolding them into their midst. All around them spears and voices were lifted towards the sky.

Sunny turned, glancing back at the cathedral as the army began their march towards distant battles and caught the profiles of her brother and her father standing at the apex of the steps, the looming cathedral rising high and dark into the sky behind them. Her father raised his head and weapon to her. He stood proud and regal as always.

Despite her own dark thoughts, Sunny was pierced by a small spark of pleasure. Things were sure to get better from here.

***

"A disgrace, a failure to your clan, and to the spirits!"

The young Drev soldier Dawn trembled and quivered on the moss-covered earth.

"The worst of all spineless creatures, even more detestable than the corpse worms that burrow through the earth," Cosma sneered. "Do you know what you are?" She sneered, walking forward to grind the ball of her foot painfully against the young Drev's back.

There was a cry of pain as Dawn flattened to the ground in a sniveling and whimpering mess. All around him, the assembled soldiers remained painfully silent in either disdain or sympathy, looking on without so much as the rattle of their armor.

"You are a coward!" Cosma spat, "a coward and a cripple!" She hissed shoving Dawn further into the ground with the heel of her foot. The young Drev whimpered, clutching his arm, an arm which had been severed at the elbow.

The wound was old, at least a day or two, and despite the odds, Dawn had not yet succumbed to infection or blood loss. It was a common wound, but based on the Drev's style and manner of combat, crippled soldiers did not fight well, thus they were useless to the clan. Drev did not have to kill their opponent to be rid of them, all you had to do was remove their limbs. With that done, they would no longer be able to fight and your army was that much stronger and closer to victory.

Dawn tried not to whimper, doing his best to crawl back onto his hands and knees, but was again shoved forcibly to the ground.

"How dare you come back here after your failure! How dare you return with your dishonor!"

Soldiers looked away unable to watch the scene unfolding before them. Dawn quivered against the moss, "Please...g-g-general, I can still fight, please let me-"

"Silence!" He was forced painfully to the ground once again; head jarring off the rocks, the impact sending a burst of white spores up into the air. Off to the side the Coiltrees creaked in a dismal wind which cut over the barren plain.

"I cannot defy tradition to reward your cowardice." Cosma raised her head. "The rules of our clan are ancient but simple. Those who are wounded beyond repair during the time of battle and live must cast themselves into the fire; therefore, ridding the clan of their burden, showing their honor, and allowing their spirits to return to the afterlife."

She turned her head down.

"You have not chosen the honorable path and so forever you will wander in disgrace, a spirit untethered, never to enter into the halls of your forbearers. From this moment forth you are nothing to this clan and so must wander the land as an outcast with only your dishonor as your clan."

Her words solidified a sudden and horrible sense of finality. The watching Drev, once so interested in the spectacle, grew still and silent, their eyes fixed past the poor quivering figure as if he was not there. Finally, some turned away and walked back to their places. The look on the young Drev's face was a frozen nightmare: the understanding of what he had done, the realization of his failure and disgrace, and the horror of his future and its finality. In panicked agony he pled in earnest to be allowed back in, to die in battle like a worthy Drev. Dawn's actions, supplication, and begging was ignored, and he was left kneeling under the weight of his misery.

Sunny watched from the sidelines with her peers, shaken by the scene before them. They had known Dawn their entire lives, had sparred with him as Drevlings and fought with him on the field of battle. Now he was a clan outcast, reduced to nothing more than a ghost in a gust of wind, unheard and unnoticed even as he cried out for their mercy and acceptance.

This young group had lingered a bit too long as a scathing look from Cosma sent them scampering back over the moss and away toward the small thicket of Coiltrees where their encampment had been made. Sunny felt a weight in that gaze that she knew was meant especially for her, not crippled enough to be cast into the fire, but not normal enough to be overlooked and left in peace.

Her mother had not spoken with her once since starting off on this campaign, but Sunny had long since accepted that as preferable. Her mother never spoke to her unless it was to say something disparaging and even if it wasn't openly apparent, there was always that hint of displeasure that colored Cosma's every word.

It was, however, a relief for Sunny to see that she wasn't the only one who had been shaken up by the events. The other young Drev were just as nervous as she was, unable to relax and so they paced around upon patches of brightly colored moss, every step sprinkling the air with spores. The great Coiltrees swayed and rocked about them, sending down the occasional blossom to alight on the plant life below. A few of the young Drev congregated in uneasy groups whispering to each other and shifting nervously to glance over their shoulders to where Dawn's voice could still be heard pitifully pleading for mercy. They hoped beyond hope that Dawn did not come to them to ask for mercy, thus making the situation that much worse for him and them.

The entire situation left Sunny with a sense of emptiness inside, knowing that one of their own had been banished from the clan. She tried to think about what it would be like, how it would feel to have no future, to be rightfully disowned by one's clan. It was too much for her to consider as it was an uncomfortable reminder of what her future could hold.

Distantly a herd of Kastar were roaming lazily over the open moss. The large creatures were the biggest herbivore on this side of the continent besides the Drev themselves. They were tall - about eleven feet in height with four, tall forward legs, and a pair of short, powerful back legs that allowed them to walk in an inclined and upright position. In addition, they had long necks and sharp beaks in order to reach the higher fruit of the Coiltrees but also to graze on the sweet moss so common in this area.

The beauty of the day with the bright sunlight and distant views was dampened by the faint but persistent pleading of Dawn, who continually begged for the attention of anyone who may listen. He must have known his efforts would be in vain, for no one defied the will of the general. Sunny hovered nervously next to her battle partner, a tall handsome Drev by the name of Moss.

She could easily admit to herself that she had admired him for some time now. Moss was almost nine feet tall with sharp yellow eyes and a carapace so deep green that it put the very plant life at his feet to startling shame. Not only that, he was a gifted fighter, and together Sunny thought they made a suitable and useful team. That thought had been in her mind for a couple of weeks now, dredged up once more at the sight of this horrible scene and the thought of her mother's expression.

Sunny knew she would never win over her mother, but perhaps if she won over a proven and valuable warrior the general would finally accept her as someone who had some measure of use to the clan. A shadow passed over them and Sunny looked up to find a lazy cloud drifting over the star.

Glancing back down, her eyes turned to Moss who seemed to have overcome his discomfort and was now doing his best to ignore what was happening, just like everyone else. Sunny turned her head slightly to the side, peering over at another young Drev who eyed Moss hungrily. Teal, named for her unique carapace, had envied Sunny's position as Moss's partner and everyone knew it. She wasn't exactly subtle in her thoughts; thoughts about Moss and her opinions on Sunny.

Teal must have noticed Sunny watching, though she tried to look indifferent as she began inching her way across open ground towards Moss. Sunny tried doing the same, walking absentmindedly into her path as if she had not seen her coming. In the end that did not work in her favor as Teal, almost a foot and a half taller, jostled Sunny to the side. Off balance, Sunny wobbled and nearly fell over, catching herself against the rigged face of the Coiltree.

Their little altercation had been just that, but that didn't stop everyone from turning to look at them. Teal sidled up beside Moss as Sunny brushed Coiltree dust from both of her left hands.

"You know...since...Dawn is now longer here; I'm missing a battle partner. I'd say that puts us on the same battlefield."

Sunny clenched her fists. Moss looked down at Teal with an expression of mild surprise and some measure of exasperation. Teal had now manoeuvred herself in between the two of them, glancing back at Sunny with a disdainful expression.

Sunny had finally had enough and before anymore could be said, she barged between the two of them, knocking Teal backwards where she nearly stumbled over a rock which was jutting from a patch of bright pink moss.

"He already has a partner," Sunny snarled.

Teal lowered her head, "No, he has YOU. There is a difference."

Something inside Sunny snapped, and she squared up to Teal, though their height difference forced Sunny to crane her neck back. "Just like you, I earned my right to be here."

Teal scoffed in derision and a second later, something hard impacted Sunny's chest sending her reeling backwards. "Please," Teal sneered, "you want truth. The only reason you are here is because the clan took pity on your infertile parents. In fact, I'd trade Dawn for you in a minute. Even with three hands he's worth two of you."

Sunny snarled, "You better hold your tongue. After all, if you had done your duty Dawn wouldn't be crippled, but here you are without shame crawling over Moss like rot on a corpse." She stepped in a bit closer, "So watch-your-place."

"Or what, you going to challenge me to a duel?"

A group had gathered around them now, curious eyes looking on in interest at the conflict. Inside Sunny felt a radiating heat that had been building up for a while now, a little flame in her chest that had years ago started as an ember and was now growing up inside her like a bonfire, spreading through her limbs and engulfing her mind. It was so hot and powerful it made her hurt inside, and she felt as if she was going to explode.

The other young Drev had slowly moved in closer to watch. They had sensed a conflict and hoped for a fight to distract their minds and hearts from Dawn.

Teal stepped forward, "Come on, Sunny," she taunted as she reached out and shoved Sunny back against the bark of a Coiltree, "challenge me to a duel." Sunny batted away her strike, but Teal came in for a second shove, "Come on!"

"Stop it you two! We have had enough for one day," Moss began, but despite him being the reason for the dispute, he was outright ignored as Sunny batted back another shove. Teal towered over her, casting a long shadow over her smaller opponent.

"Are you just going to stand there like a coward!" The bonfire deep in her chest exploded. Sunny's vision grew dark while in the back of her head she could hear countless voices from her past telling her she had never been good enough. She heard her mother's words to Dawn as if they were words to her: a coward, a disgrace to the spirits and to the clan, a crippled Drev. Sunny remembered every late night overheard argument between her mother and father about how she should throw herself into the volcano so as not to disgrace their family, or how she would never bring honor to her clan. Dawn's voice began to fade behind the sharp demands of her mother's long ago words.

And that's what did it. Hearing the slow fade of Dawn's life and being unable to help but feeling that it was her own, Sunny snapped. Dawn's fate was her future if she didn't act. She had to do something that would solidify her standing instead of keeping her as a stagnant lava pool to be ridiculed and pitied.

Teal shoved Sunny once again as white petals were shaken from the branches of the Coiltree, falling to the ground like floating ash during a cinderstorm. Sunny watched one of the white petals fell past Teal's head, tracking it through space in slow motion as Teal stepped forward once more to assault, confront or abuse Sunny.

As slow as the world was going, Sunny had no issue in ducking out of the way and stepping to the side as Teal's hand's impacted the hard bark of the tree behind her. Splinters exploded in a rainbow of shards as she staggered back, hissing and waving her hands from the pain.

Sunny looked up at Teal. "I think you are exactly right," Sunny said, hearing her own voice as if her head had been stuck under water, a distant echoing sound that rippled through the air around her and vibrated against her ears.

Teal paused in her tracks both confused and wary as she watched Sunny. She moved as if she was about to challenge Teal, and then suddenly made a ninety-degree turn and stepped in front of Moss.

"Moss, I challenge you to a duel by the rights of unarmed combat."

...

The clearing they were in went completely still. The world slowed down: moss spores were frozen in beams of sunlight, volcanic noises faded, the cool breeze whispered past as a shadow moved over the clearing.

No one moved, no one spoke.

The other Drev watched in open-mouthed astonishment. Teal took a step back in surprise, and Moss looked the most surprised of all. Everyone knew the meaning of duel by unarmed combat. They had practiced it as children many times, but that practice had stopped well before their adolescence... before it could mean anything. Before it could mean what it now meant.

To find a battle partner.

Moss glanced around at the others desperately hoping to hear someone laugh, to hear that it was all a joke. Sunny saw his reaction and recoiled. If only she could trade places with Dawn in that moment. If she was an outcast, she would never have to see that look that she had seen so many times before, the same look that was on Moss's face now. In his expression she saw... she saw....

Disgust.

It wasn't blatantly obvious, but since Sunny was so accustomed with the expression and its manifestation, she knew what it was. She had seen it in the eyes of her mother plenty of times, she had seen it on the faces of her instructors, her religious leaders and most of the clan.

All this time she thought they had been friends; thought they had been good partners.

But Moss had not, in fact, been any of those things. He had been kind to her, even tolerated her, but it was duty which dictated his actions. Moss was a good Drev, he was proud and dutiful. Sunny saw now he was only doing his duty.

Around them the others were starting to recover from their shock, and from the corner of her eye, Sunny watched as hands were raised to cover faces. Others hunched inwards on themselves, slinking back towards the line of the trees, not willing to witness her humiliation; first Dawn and now Sunny. It was too much for some of the young Drev.

"She did not just..." a Drev to her left trailed off as he covered his eyes.

Sunny's head echoed with the shocked expressions from the crowd. She felt a familiar, horrible squeezing pain that wrapped around her chest, pierced her lungs and stopped her from breathing. She could feel moisture welling up around the breathing holes just above her collar bones, and she felt that tingling sensation that came from great sadness or hurt. She hadn't felt like this since.... since she was a Drevling.

She took a few deep breaths trying to clear up the moisture that had gathered there, hoping that it did not overflow and spill down her chest where everyone could see. She looked up at Moss, stood her ground and looked him in the eye. The world echoed and spun but she held steady. A snort of mirth brought Sunny back into the world like the popping as air pressure equalizes.

"How could you challenge Moss to be a battle pair?" Teal spat in derision.

Sunny continued to stare at Moss who had such a pained expression on his face it was as if he too was ready to pitch himself into a volcano.

"Sunny," began Moss, "you didn't mean it right?"

The clearing was very silent, "Of course she didn't mean it," snorted Teal.

A few more of the watching Drev scooted back, holding their hands over their mouths. Moss looked like he wanted to trade places with Dawn. He stared pleadingly at Sunny but Sunny remained resolute. She was done. She was done cowering, she was done retracting her true feelings and intentions, she was done being a thing to be pitied and ridiculed. She would never please her mother, and she knew it.

Now was as good a time as any to put it all on the line.

So, she stood her ground, looked Moss in the eye and firmly stated, "Someone draw a circle."

Moss shook his head minutely at her, his face pulled into an expression of distress and embarrassment, "Sunny, what are you doing?"

Around them, the entire group stared in stunned dismay. More Drev abandoned the circle hurriedly seeking sanctuary from the dreadful scene before them.

"I said, draw a circle," Sunny said, her voice strong, her expression unwavering as she held his gaze.

The watching Drev whispered and cringed as they moved to clear a circle, pulling compasses from their bags and pacing out a spot on the moss they carved away the little plants and their clinging roots from the stone until there was a well-defined ring in which combat would take place.

Sunny could hear their whispers.

"She can't be serious."

"She couldn't actually think that-"

"Her and Moss would never-"

What had she done? She could feel the slow tingling in her limbs, the warm flow of shame into her body. She wanted to run she wanted to. -No! She pulled herself back, back out from those pitiful useless thoughts, gritting her teeth and digging her mind in. She would not back down now. Not this time

No matter what it meant, she would see it through because no matter what they said, she was no coward.

Moss was ushered just outside the far side of the circle as she stayed rooted to her spot opposite of him, just outside of the ring. The group was growing even smaller now as Drev drew back into the trees, unwilling to watch but also unwilling to look away. They knew it would be the most recoiling scene they would ever witness. Many wished for battle to begin, so they would not have to see this. Moss looked around desperately for help, but no one came to his aid. What could they do anyways? A challenge or invitation was issued and so the ritual must be performed.

Sunny's chest tightened - from nerves, anticipation, or bubbling anger she did not know. This was worse than the armoring ceremony, and yet she knew he would live. The penalties of her blunder could not be worse than the life she already lived.

She was prepared for what was to come.

She heard more mirth from a few feet away so she turned to see Teal standing there, watching. Sunny stepped into the circle, and across from her Moss mimicked her action.

The expression on his face had morphed wildly over the past few minutes. He was openly cringing now as if he had stepped in something gross. And perhaps that was true, he had stepped into her life, and everything about that was unsavory.

In a way it was almost funny.

She looked up at Moss and grew immediately resolute. He was a good two feet taller than her, if not more. He was everything she was not. He was a good fighter and hadn't lost a duel in months while she had never won one. There was no way she could win this fight, no way could that she even make a good showing, but she would not give in.

What would her father think? Would this be where she disappointed him, where she lost her standing in his eyes? She had to take the risk, she had to prove to herself, if no one else, that she was worthy to be a Drev in this clan. Her father would understand. He must.

But the thought of losing his support and love made an ache well up deep inside her. A hurt that stung so bad a spring of moisture started in her breathing tubes. She tried to fight it back, tried to stun the moisture, but it continued to gather there.

Please spirits...no.

And then it overflowed, sending a line moisture dribbling down her chest on the one side. She felt it happen, watched Moss's face as he saw it too, the way he cringed away from her in disgust. She tried to wipe it discreetly away with one arm, but not before Teal noticed it too

"You're crying in battle?" Teal mocked.

The mocking echoed in her head.

She closed her eyes, forgive me father.

Sunny focused all of her fears, her disappointments, her hard work, her hopes and her will and regained her composure and sprang expectantly at Moss.

He stepped back, startled, not having expected her to make the first move. He tried to duck out of the way, but was too slow. Her shoulder impacted him in the chest, just below his carapace, and a burst of air puffed from his lungs as he staggered back, slipping on a loose stone and almost falling over.

She used his balance against him, running forward and kicking his other leg out from under him.

All four of his arms wheeled, his eyes wide in surprise and confusion as he was knocked to his back.

Around the circle the others gasped in shock and surprise.

She followed him to the ground, catching his hands in her own, pinning one under her knee, pinning another with her foot. She had two hands on his left arm now struggling against his superior strength.

She almost had him, but her foot slipped against a loose patch of moss, and she lost her grip on his hand. He was able to push her away, and then with a powerful kick, she was sent sprawling backwards. He would have had the chance to attack her again, but he didn't take it, this time standing and going on the defensive.

She threw herself to her feet with a snarl and came after him again.

He tried to block her, but she ducked under his arm and caught him across the side of the face with a vicious blow that sent him staggering sideways.

For a moment she thought she felt a spark of hope.

But that was when his surprise faded. His defense tightened up. He caught her next blow with an open palm, tugging her forward and violently striking her in the stomach. He let her go to fall back into the dirt.

She rolled to her side, but he took his moment this time, kicking her back onto her side.

She tried rolling away, but he followed.

They struggled against each other, and for that time Sunny was aware of nothing else. She caught him in the face with an elbow, but she figured too late that he had left himself open for. Before she knew it, he had a hand around her throat and was lifting her into the air.

Her feet kicked and wriggled, but no ground met her feet.

Hot air puffed from the breathing holes at the base of her neck. She stared into Moss's face, refusing to look away.

Without warning, a shadow fell over them, Appearing as if from nowhere; a vast, looming figure towered over them, casting a shadow long and deep across their forms. Startled, Moss pushed her to the side, and she fell to the ground with a clatter, coming to rest in the center of the shadow produced by the looming, oppressive presence that now surrounded her on all sides. Sunny knew this shadow, better than she knew her own.

General Cosma stood over her, arrayed in her glorious silver armor and swirling purple cape, spear planted heavily against the ground.

On her face she wore a look of disgust and malice so profound it froze Sunny where she lay sprawled. "Get up!" Cosma snapped. Sunny's strength failed her as she attempted to rise. Cosma slammed her spear into the ground, "I said GET UP!"

Arms quivering, legs quaking completely out of control, Sunny crawled to her feet. She went to bow her head, but at the last moment stopped, keeping her eyes straight. The commotion had drawn back some of the old crowd and beckoned a new one. She could see the faces of older Drev staring down at her with masks of delight or shame. Maybe now Sunny would meet the fate she should have expected as a Drevling.

General Cosma's contempt-filled eyes raked over Sunny's appearance. Her eyes began to twitch with absolute rage as she saw Sunny's armor wet from emotion, covered in dirt and stained with blood.

"Disgusting creature," Cosma hissed.

Sunny's legs almost gave out, but by sheer force of will she kept herself upright, standing defiantly before Cosma's penetrating stare. Finally, she found the guts to say to Sunny what she had whispered behind her back for so many years. In a way it was almost relieving: vindicating. Inside she felt a certain sense of glee to make her mother feel the shame she lived with every day.

Cosma looked first to Moss, "My apologies, young warrior for my progeny," she spat the word out like it was acrid with sulfuric acid. She turned to the group, held her head high as to not acknowledge her pathetic offspring. "Battle and its effects and consequences prey on the weak and make them unable to make rational and realistic judgments." She jerked her head at Sunny, "She could never hope to win a battle pair and thus pass on tainted genetics."

The group nodded eagerly, willing to accept any explanation that justified such poor social conduct. Looking over the crowd, Sunny knew no one would challenge her mother's explanation of the events of the last few minutes. A part of her wondered if she herself should explain, give her reasoning. But no, they didn't deserve her reasoning, and she no longer cared what they thought.

"Back to your training!" Cosma snapped, "You will not slack in your practice, even during times of war!"

Cosma turned sharply grabbing Sunny around the arm and swiftly marching them from the circle with Sunny stumbling and tripping, her feet scrambling across the stone and slipping on uprooted patches of moss. Once or twice she almost fell, but General Cosma's firm grip on her arm kept Sunny upright with the power of her anger. Sunny tripped again, this time unable to gain her feet. She fell in pain as Cosma dragged her across the stone.

"Get on your feet," she snapped.

Sunny tried, but Cosma was going too fast, and she was unable to gain her feet, fruitlessly scrabbling at the ground in desperation.

Eventually General Cosma snarled in disgust, and tossed Sunny to the ground with a grunt. Sunny tumbled sideways until she came to rest in a heap on the flat stone just beyond the hill where the rest of the clan was gathered. Sunny did not bother to get up. She focused on the mountains of the volcanic belt which rose up beside them, and on the roaring gurgle of the lava and a barely discernible soft rush of wind.

Cosma huffed and spun in a circle, "Look at me!"

Sunny refused at first but realized she was interested in what her mother had to say.

Overhead, Cosma balled her hands into fists then lifted her head to the sky, "What....have...you...done?"

Sunny remained silent.

"I will tell you what you have done. You have shamed yourself, and worse, you have shamed this family. You have been tolerated but don't expect to be tolerated now. You have destroyed any chance you had at being accepted into this clan. You are a disgrace, an embarrassment and a liability."

Cosma visibly stiffened as she turned away and lifted her head to the sky, "It was I who was too weak once. I should have done what was asked of me. I should have thrown you to the fires the moment you were born. Symbolically I do so now."

Behind Cosma the light was beginning to fade, their sun was falling behind the volcanic crags, dulling the sky to a fiery orange. The magnetic lines in the sky warped with the light turning from lines of rainbow into a pale shimmer with the fading of the sun.

Sunny did not speak. What would have been the point? She had always hoped she would win her mother's approval but now all hope was lost. Sunny felt a bewildering lightness well up inside her.

Would it be inappropriate to laugh?

"You will stay by my side during our battles, and when we return home you will stay with your father. You will remain as silent and unseen as possible. Your birthday should have been your death day but today will be your death day."

The sun sunk further, and little sparks of fire became visible along the shadowy face of the mountainside as they rose into the night. Stars appeared, winking into existence on the distant horizon as night approached. The first and largest star to appear was Eedachel-- a leading light-- used for thousands of years to navigate their way across the planet during the clear months between dark seasons.

Sunny watched from where she lay on the ground as the star grew brighter, though it's touch was distant and cold. It led Drev for thousands of years across vast wastes. Could it now lead Sunny on?

General Cosma had stepped away now, a dark brooding presence on the not-so-distant hilltop. A shadow against the stars, her cloak billowed softly across the long arm of their galaxy. A shooting star passed over head, disappearing over the sparks cast by the subtly rumbling lava flow.

As Sunny breathed life and conviction from the scene, she became aware of a rumbling that had not been there before. Sunny lifted herself partially from the ground, skin sticking to the stone with the coagulation of moisture at her throat and chest. She stared down at the ground as she could now feel the rumbling vibration in the palms of her hands.

She glanced towards where General Cosma stood and noted her stiff posture as she too had suddenly taken to staring down at the ground, and then towards the volcanic belt with some measure of apprehension. The rumbling grew deeper, stronger, billowing out through the earth in great rolling vibrations.

Sunny sprang to her feet, stepping back as she watched rocks jump and jostle on the ground below her. After a moment staring, she too turned her head towards the volcano.

There were tales of volcanoes erupting violently, but not these volcanoes. They were oozing volcanoes, constantly relieving internal pressure. They did not explode. They had never exploded but the rumbling in the ground was growing heavier. The shaking caused her to almost stagger and fall to her knees. Smoke from the sides and open-top of the fiery mountain.

In the distance, she could hear the frantic calls of the clan. General Cosma remained where she was. If an eruption was imminent, fleeing would change nothing.

Perhaps the spirits were angry at the day's events or at the clan's performance in battle.

Fire pulsed and throbbed at the corner of the mountain. Sunny was on her knees and even General Cosma had lowered herself to the ground unable to keep her balance on the undulating stone. Sunny became scared for the first time that day. Was this the end? Was she to die like this? She reflected on her life and realized at that moment that she didn't want to die.

The atmosphere grew brighter and brighter and brighter, until the light of the fire lit the land like the pulsing of a noonday sun. And then it came, the eruption.

Sunny was violently knocked the rest of the way to the ground, landing on her side. Lava spewed from vents in the side of the mountain as a great exhaust of pressure erupted upwards, bringing with it a spume of ash.

Then came a trail of fire and smoke. Oddly, it didn't come from the mountain itself, but from a dormant lava field to the side of the mountain. Sunny lay there confused and startled as a trail of white hot fire blazed in the sky. She scrambled back across the stone, craning her head to watch as the inferno and an object rocketed into the heavens. She expected it to lose energy and slacken, but it just kept going, leaving a trail of bleached smoke behind it as it did.

As she stared, the object grew smaller and smaller in her vision, until there was nothing left but a distant spark, which soon winked out.

The night grew silent again, the ground still, and she was left leaning on her hands as she stared up into the vast sky above. Above her, on the hilltop, a pale blue light winked into existence.

"I demand to know what's going on," General Cosma snapped, barely audible over the roaring of the fire.

Sunny was surprised, she had never seen her mother use the long-distance communication devices. As a traditionalist, she openly opposed new technologies, but whatever had just happened, whatever they had just seen, was something far more significant than Sunny could imagine.

She couldn't begin to guess what sort of changes it heralded, but she welcomed them whatever they were.


End file.
